Sorenstam has some work to do in her final tournament
Published 3:00 pm Thursday, November 20, 2008
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Annika Sorenstam arrived at the first tee Thursday morning, shook a few hands and got a kiss on the cheek from Donald Trump.
Then she turned to the gallery and waved.
On Friday, unless she moves a bit up the leaderboard, she’ll be waving goodbye.
Sorenstam shot a 2-over-par 74 in Thursday’s opening round of the ADT Championship, good for a tie for 23rd in the 32-woman event, her final tournament before “stepping away” from competitive golf. The field gets trimmed to 16 after Friday’s play, meaning Sorenstam has some work remaining just to reach the weekend.
Otherwise, a Hall-of-Fame career will likely come to an unceremonious end.
“I was a little nervous. I feel like I’m playing good. I’m excited about the week,” Sorenstam said. “But I’m telling you, nothing went my way today.”
Indeed, it was not a dominant round for the woman who once controlled her sport. She went barefoot into the water on the par-3 seventh to salvage a bogey and was 4-over through 10 holes, putting her into what seemed like a precarious spot.
But as she’s done so many times throughout her 72-win career, she rallied.
Sorenstam put together consecutive birdies on the par-4 14th and par-5 15th to stop the bogey bleeding and eventually finished six shots behind Katherine Hull (68).
Sorenstam is a four-time ADT winner and a giant fan of the Trump International course, but in this double-cut, erase-the-scores format, she’s never even reached the weekend.
The scores are erased after Friday’s play, then get wiped clear again after Saturday’s round, with just the top eight invited back Sunday to play for the $1 million winner’s prize.
“You can’t really practice this format. It’s once a year,” said Sorenstam, who six month ago announced her plans to leave the game, start a family and tend to her business interests. “You just have to go out and play your best golf and see where you stand.”
Hull, one of the hottest players on tour over the past three months, finished one shot better than Ji-Yai Shin and In-Kyung Kim. Three others — Ji Young Oh, Eun-Hee Ji and Na Yeon Choi — were two strokes off Hull’s pace.
