“Well, by George, she’s done it.  She’s only gone and done it.”

The fair lady I’m referring to is world No 1 Nelly Korda who, last Sunday, won the US Women’s Open at Riviera Country Club on the outskirts of Los Angeles.  She once described her relationship with this major as “complicated” and openly admitted this was the prize she coveted above all else.  Being runner-up last year to Maja Stark only fuelled that desire.

Things didn’t start off too well for America’s golden girl.  An opening 73 meant that no fewer than 55 players had her in their rearview mirror and she trailed first-round leader Jennifer Kupcho by a whopping seven shots.  Admitting to nerves and assessing that that made her tighten up, Korda had to rely heavily on her short game throughout the week.  It didn’t disappoint.  Out of the thirty occasions she was required to get up and down to save par she managed it two dozen times.

A brace of 67s (against a par of 71) in rounds two and three meant Nelly had clawed her way up to the summit of the leaderboard where she found herself sharing top spot with Sei Young Kim on six under par.

During a tense Sunday the cheers ringing around the course alerted her to a Charley Hull charge of epic proportions.  The Englishwoman had survived the cut by the slenderest of margins but a brilliant, best-of-the-championship 65 on Saturday brought her to only three shy of the leading duo.  An opening eagle at the first and a birdie at the third in the final round was a serious declaration of intent.  Charley added four more birdies to that tally but a trio of bogeys, sprinkled between the 9th and the 14th holes, were her undoing – and two of those bogeys were down to three-putting.

It all added up to one shot more than Korda and a shared second place with Mexican Gaby Lopez who had a blistering inward Sunday nine of three under to finish alongside Charley.

Exuding a composure she didn’t feel, Nelly timed her run to the line perfectly, assuming the outright lead for the first time after birdieing her penultimate hole.  Her lifelong dream came true when her two and a half footer on the final green did a lap of honour before disappearing underground.  She was immediately greeted by her sister Jessica and the rest of her family opening a bottle of champagne.

“I feel like I’m in a dream,” said Korda, “Gosh, I just can’t even explain how much this means to me.”

What it does mean in terms of stark statistics is that she has now won nineteen LPGA titles, which includes four majors, and is a mere two points shy of entry into the Hall of Fame.  She cements her position at the top of the world rankings and is also the first player for more than a decade to win back-to-back majors.  Let’s not forget either that she already has an Olympic gold medal tucked away and, at 27 years of age, arguably still has her best golfing years ahead.

This was also a championship particularly notable for strong performances from the amateur contingent.

American Curtis Cup player and No 1 in the world, Kiara Romero, finished joint sixth on three under, five behind Nelly, and won the medal for the low amateur.  One shot behind in joint eighth place came Colombian Maria Jose Marin, the current Augusta National Women’s Amateur Champion and Aphrodite Deng, the Canadian whizz kid, also cracked the top twenty finishing on level par for tied seventeenth place.

Two further American Curtis Cup stars were also in fine form – Asterisk Talley, who finished joint 22nd on two over par  and Farah O’Keefe, who was four over and finished tied 34th.

By now Romero, Talley and O’Keefe will have made the short hop across town to the swanky Bel-Air Country Club for the 44th playing of the Curtis Cup.  Their teammates took some time out from their own preparations to spend a day at the US Women’s Open just relaxing and drinking in the vibe of a big-time tournament.  Great Britain & Ireland did likewise but only had one team member teeing it up at Riviera, Nelly Ong, who missed the cut.

The almighty Americans are nearly always far stronger on paper so it’s probably just as well that the match isn’t actually played on paper – and don’t forget that GB&I, under the captaincy of Catriona Matthew, are defending the cup after their epic win at Sunningdale two years ago.

This year Curtis Cup aficionados from this side of the pond will be celebrating the 40th anniversary of GB&I’s first, and only, victory on American soil, which took place at Prairie Dunes in the searing heat of Hutchinson, Kansas.  That was masterminded by the formidable Diane Bailey and has yet to be matched by any other Curtis Cup captain.  That team is planning a reunion at Lytham at the end of July.

Meanwhile, this year Catriona Matthew will attempt to emulate that feat and she has, as they say, got “previous” in that she has both played in and captained a winning Solheim Cup team away from home.

She will recognise the formidable task ahead of her charges but her wisdom and experience will tell her that for the three Americans who played at the sharp end of such an energy-sapping championship as a US Women’s Open it will be a tall order to refresh mentally and physically for the pressures of a Curtis Cup a mere five days later.

I hope that whatever the outcome the players will have one of the best and most memorable weeks of their golfing lives.  I know there will be highs and lows – as there always should be in the cut and thrust of high level sport.  The home team will perform well, of that I have no doubt, but I trust that my American pals will forgive me if I say I really do hope the away team performs just a teensy-weensy bit better!

Play away.

Sweden’s Maja Stark (above) is the defending champion at this week’s US Women’s Open which is being played at Riviera Country Club, nestled in the swanky district of Pacific Palisades, around half an hour from the centre of Los Angeles.

The feisty Solheim Cup player has had a quiet enough year since her big breakthrough in Wisconsin last year but she’s certainly not out of place on the short but high quality list of Swedes to have lifted this major.  The trailblazer was Lotta Neumann who won wire to wire in 1988 at Baltimore Country Club, one of the first 100 courses to be established in America.  It was Lotta’s maiden victory on the LPGA and when she hoisted the trophy aloft she made history by becoming the first Swede, male or female, to win a major title.

It’s easy to consign a career and a life to statistics and Lotta’s 27 worldwide victories and six Solheim Cup appearances as a player roll off the tongue easily enough.  However, add to that her achievement of being the first European Solheim Cup captain to win a contest on American soil, which she did in 2013 at Colorado Golf Club just outside Denver, and you can see the widespread influence she has had on the game.

In the 1980s and 1990s the powerhouse that was Swedish golf was just gaining momentum and quality players rolled off the yellow and blue production line with tremendous regularity.  It was from this hotbed of potential that arguably the greatest Swedish talent of all was honed and burnished.  A young, shy Annika Sorenstam turned professional in 1992 and recorded her first professional win in December 1994 in Australia, at Royal Adelaide.

It was in June of the  following year, however, that she really lit the blue touchpaper, winning her first LPGA event and her first major, the US Women’s Open, at The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs.  That year she won the moneylists on both sides of the Atlantic and the professional career of one of the best women ever to play the game was launched.  She forged a successful defence of her US Open title the following year at Pine Needles in Southern Pines, North Carolina and completed the hattrick eleven years later in 2006 at Newport Country Club, Rhode Island.  Three US Open wins leave her trailing only two players in the history of the women’s game, Americans Betsy Rawls and the incomparable Mickey Wright, a fellow career grand slam winner, both of whom won four of their national titles.

By the time the Swede was finished playing she was globally known by the single moniker, “Annika.”

This championship, first played in 1946, is being played for the 81st time this week and Sweden’s three players with their five wins place their country third in the league table of titles won by nationality.  Top of the list, unsurprisingly, are the Americans with 53 wins spread between 34 homegrown winners but it is the South Koreans who are leading the modern-day charge with ten of their elite players scooping eleven titles, all since 1998.

Kudos to England who are in fifth place with those memorable victories of Laura Davies in 1987 and her colleague, Alison Nicholas, a decade later, in 1997.  Laura triumphed at Plainfield Country Club in New Jersey in an 18 hole play-off against two-time champ JoAnne Carner, known to all and sundry as Big Momma, and Japanese superstar Ayako Okamoto.

A swashbuckling, effervescent career followed for the hugely talented and exciting Davies and galleries followed Laura wherever she went.  Her competitive playing days are behind her but she’s an invaluable member of  the Sky Sports commentary team providing unique insights on the game.  To this day, if you mention “Laura” everyone knows instantly to whom you refer while some close pals call her “Damo”, an affectionate reference to her title of Dame of the British Empire.

The week after her US victory I remember Laura returning triumphantly, cradling the trophy, to St Mellion where we were playing the Women’s British Open.  In a portent of things to come Ali won that particular week but our championship, alas, had not at that stage been accorded major status, so the diminutive Yorkshire woman had another decade to wait before grabbing that major championship.

The sister, Patricia, has always declared that the Nicholas triumph at Pumpkin Ridge, for her, surpassed any major victory by any European, man or woman.  Alison found herself up against the darling of American golf, Nancy Lopez, who at 40 years of age had done everything in the game – everything that is, except win her own national title.  She had been runner-up three times and was roared on by understandably partisan galleries.  That week in 1997 she became the first player in championship history to break 70 in all four rounds, but still it wasn’t enough.  Alison tapped in from a foot on the final green to record an epic one-stroke victory.

France is the only other European country to record a win in this venerable championship thanks to the incomparable Catherine Lacoste who won in 1967 in Hot Springs, Virginia.  She remains the only amateur winner of the championship.

So, at the moment, it’s nul points for Scotland, Ireland and Wales at the US Women’s Open and, unfortunately, there’s not any great reason to think that’ll change this week.  There’s many a savvy fan, however, keeping an eye on Englishwoman Lottie Woad, who is building a strong major resumé in her, as yet, brief professional career.  Her last three major appearances read 8th, 3rd and 7th proving what her amateur career suggested – that she has the game for the biggest stage of all.

It will be intriguing to watch who can add their name to this illustrious roll of honour and to watch their careers unfold.  Can the defending champ Maja Stark emulate Annika by winning in consecutive years?  Can she, indeed, chart a career that merits her being universally known by her first name alone – like Annika and Laura?

As a footnote, last week I received a message from my painter, out of the blue, which, without preamble, read:  “In an Irish pub in Lower Bridge Street, Chester.  Photo on wall.  Apparently Laura has been in twice.”

To my knowledge my painter isn’t a golfer but I knew instantly who was in that picture.  I got him to send it through to me.

Yep, there she was – the 1987 US Women’s Open Champion.

Scorchio.

Are you enjoying the weather at the moment?  Or is it all just too, too much?  After all, consecutive days in the 30s in May are not usual for us here in the UK and Ireland.  I wonder have you altered your usual mode of going so that you can “get things done” before the heat of the day?

Boy, it reminds me of playing the Asian tour back in the nineties and using those special umbrellas that reflected the heat back away from you.  We, the players, all carried those while the poor caddies laboured under the weight of golf bags laden with several litre-bottles of water.  After each set of three holes each unopened bottle was swapped for one directly out of the fridges at the handily-placed refreshment huts – so there was an unending supply of cool, refreshing liquid.

We were normally out in Asia in February and perhaps a bit of March and the tour took us from Taiwan (now Chinese Taipei) to Thailand to the Philippines and Indonesia.  Generally, it was considered too hot for us to be safely on the course in the heat of the day so it was as if time had slipped and our working/waking hours changed drastically.

Alarm clocks were set for just after 3am with our transport from the hotel departing at around 4am.  Normally we had at least an hour’s travel to the course – and as you can imagine there wasn’t much chat on the coach at that hour of the day.  We arrived at the course in the dark, had breakfast and were able to hit the range just as the sun was coming up.  The first tee-off time was 6.30 and I seem to recall us all being off the course and back on the coach around 2pm or so.

We’d roll back to the hotel roughly twelve hours after we had left it.  This was in the days when, on this tour, it was mandatory for the players to all stay in the tournament hotel and use the official transport – it was considered safer to do so.  It did, however, make for very long days indeed, because if your tee time was, say, 9.30am, you still had to be on that bus that arrived at the course just after 5ish.

By the time 7pm rolled around you were bushed, searching for dinner and bed in very quick order.  It really was a strange existence shifting our waking and working hours to the 3am to 8pm timeframe.  Don’t get me wrong, we were very grateful for the tournaments but we did have a lot to contend with in those early days – apart from the awkward timings, travel and different food, that is.

I remember playing in Manila and I was drawn with a Japanese player who spoke no English and of course, I spoke no Japanese.  Neither caddy spoke English and we were a two-ball as the third member of our group withdrew because she was ill.  I had the habit of putting my identifying mark on my golf balls on the 1st tee and I always put one dot in a specific place on the first ball I was going to use.  I would always give my caddy a ball to keep handy in case of a need to reload or, indeed, play a provisional.  That ball would have two dots on it to distinguish it from ball number one.  (I always played the same number.)

Anyway, on this occasion I knocked the ball on in two at the par 4 1st hole, marked the ball and handed it to my caddy to clean.  A couple of putts later and I had a nice opening par under my belt, as had my Japanese partner who maintained the honour from the 1st.  It was inevitable that as a two-ball, in amongst a load of threes, we would be waiting all day – and so it proved.

As we were waiting on the next tee for the group ahead to get out of the way I looked at the ball in my hand and my heart stopped as I saw two dots on the ball.  I realised instantly what had happened.  I had given the ball to my caddy to clean and she had handed me the other ball which she was keeping in the pocket of her caddy bib.  That was going to mean I had a two-shot penalty for playing the wrong ball and I’d have to return to the green to the point from which I had putted, replace the correct ball and proceed from there.  Try explaining that to a trio of non-English speakers who couldn’t understand why on earth I wanted to retrace my steps to the 1st green!

Eventually, a referee arrived who did speak English and confirmed what I already knew and a six was entered on my scorecard after I had returned to the green and re-putted.  It was my own fault but my little Filipina caddy didn’t meet my eye for a few holes.  Finally, she took a deep breath, drew herself up to her full five feet, and in very broken English said, “So sorry, Miss Mo.”

I tried to reassure her by gesture that I wasn’t blaming her and so we continued on with the round.  As chance would have it the referee who had come out to confirm the ruling was doing a stint in the recorder’s office when I arrived to sign my card.  When the clerking was all done she complimented me on how nice I had been to my caddy.

I said, well, it was ultimately the player’s responsibility to which she responded, “Yes, you’re right, but so many players use a particular ball for putting that she would be used to handing over the “putting ball”.  I couldn’t believe my ears and asked was that common amongst the Asian players to which she responded with a cheerful affirmative.

Did I kick off about the unfairness that at least a third of the field were merrily doing what I had mistakenly done and yet they weren’t being penalised?

No, I didn’t – I sucked it up and got on with it – two wrongs don’t make a right.

And anyway, a bit like this week, it was far, far too hot.

Scorchio, in fact.

There are many qualities in sport and life that high achievers tend to share.  They are usually skilful, hard-working, resilient and possessed of indefatigable perseverance but one of the things that I truly love about golf is that the very best also come in a variety of shapes and sizes and it’s possible to list as many differences between major champions as it is similarities.  Add in to the mix the wide array of golf courses and conditions that would-be major winners face and you begin to understand there is no blueprint for a major golf champion.  As I’m always fond of pointing out – you can’t film what makes a player great.  It’s lodged deep in his or her soul or psyche.

It’s a rare Englishman (Justin Rose is one) that can have every Celtic golfer I know rooting for him.  Historically, the Irish, Scots and Welsh (the Celts) are collectively known to support ABEs – Anyone But the English – all stemming from years of a deep-seated sense of inferiority, I suspect.  Well, that rarest of Englishmen, Wolverhampton’s Aaron Rai, joined the major champion club last Sunday when he bested the field in the 108th PGA Championship at Aronimink just outside Philadelphia – and it says such a lot about the man when his victory was greeted with near-universal delight by his fellow competitors and peers.

Xander Schauffele, winner of this championship in 2024, summed him up beautifully with the phrase, “all-world gentleman, no doubt”.  Rory McIlroy opined, “There won’t be one person on this property who won’t be happy for him,” and Jon Rahm said,  “I have heard consistently there’s very few people that are nicer and kinder human beings than Aaron Rai.”

Quite the validation for the 31-year old who first swung a club at 3 Hammers Golf Complex as a four-year old and joined Patshull Park as a five-year old.  Incidentally, the Ladies’ European Tour held a tournament back in the day at Patshull Park which was won by Anne Rollo (nee Jones) and around that time I used the facility a great deal as I worked with a physical trainer who was attached there.  I think we just missed overlapping with the young Aaron.

It’s well documented how Aaron’s father scraped and saved to manage to buy the youngster his first set of clubs and Rai junior lovingly cleaned those clubs protecting, not only the woods with covers, but the irons as well – a habit he employs to this day to ensure, as he says, that he never loses his perspective or sight of where he has come from.

There was early evidence of the discipline he would bring to his game when, as a fifteen-year old he set a world record in holing 207 consecutive 10 footers. and this same discipline was much in evidence last week as he wore down his opposition.  A strategist and tactician, Aaron’s thoughtful, studied approach was the perfect foil to Aronimink, a course with deceptive difficulty off the tee and ferocious green complexes.  He stayed in his own bubble and when the pressure was at its height he covered the last ten holes of the championship in six under par.

No one could live with him.  He won by three, adding his first major to his list of victories as a professional which had hitherto read:  three wins on the HotelPlanner tour, three on the DP World tour and one on the PGA tour.

I wonder if we’ll now see a proliferation of players playing with two gloves, a habit the young Aaron acquired to combat the cold of all those winter rounds as a youngster.  When the summer came he found himself unable to discard the right-hand glove as the grip didn’t feel so secure.

Sean Foley, who coaches many of the top players, has always said he doesn’t understand why golfers mostly only play with a glove on their lead hand.  He points out that baseball players use two gloves and that traction and force applied down the bat provides more power.  I don’t pretend to understand the physics of it all but it does seem that the one-glove option may be more of an affectation than anything truly useful……..and the manufacturers could earn a good deal more selling gloves in pairs!

The new champion gives a great deal of credit for his performance inside the ropes to the support he receives outside the ropes from his wife, Gaurika Bishnoi, who is also a professional golfer.  Bishnoi, originally from Gurugram in India has won eight times on the Hero Women’s Pro Golf Tour, twice finishing as the number one player.  She has caddied for him in the past, as has he for her on the Ladies’ European tour and they spend many hours practising together and having chipping, putting and wedge contests.

Outside the ropes she lives and dies every shot with her husband and on Sunday, when watching his composure and attitude under the severest pressure, she knew that if he didn’t win then he assuredly would in the future.  Aaron certainly doesn’t underestimate how much she helps him – “I’m not exaggerating when I say I wouldn’t be here without her.

“Her mindset, her advice, her thoughts, whether it’s technique or the way I’m holding myself is absolutely invaluable,” Rai said of his wife. “She encompasses so many different sides in her opinions.”

They’re quite a team, a popular team – and now they’re a major team.  The sky’s the limit.