Can Canada turn Hull's season around?
BY Bruce Young | LPGA Tour | 2009 Canadian Womens Open | Preview | 01 Sep 2009
Katherine Hull returns to what was perhaps her greatest moment in golf when she tees it up this week at this week’s CN Canadian Women’s Open at the Priddis Greens Golf and Country Club in Calgary.
The defending champion won this event at the Ottawa Hunt and Golf Club last year when she defeated Se Ri Pak by one shot and in doing so won her first LPGA Tour event , elevating her status in world golf and confirming much of the potential she had often displayed in her amateur and early professional years.
When she left Australia earlier this year it seemed that her second win would not take long to secure. She had after all finished runner up at the NSW and New Zealand Opens and then won the Australia’s most prestigious female tournament, the ANZ Ladies Masters in the early weeks of the year.
Hull would also finish runner up to Ji Yai Shin in the LPGA event in Singapore but since returning to the US her game has not lived up to expectations in 2009. Interestingly however her form leading into last year’s event had not been particularly good either and it may be that the Canada could again get things back on track.
Hull’s previous best LPGA finish to her victory last year had been when runner up in Canada in 2005 so this event holds special memories for her and it might just serve to get things heading in the right direction. After missing the cut last week in Oregon this week might just be the tonic she needs.
The Priddis Greens Golf and Country Club is located around 40 kilometres west of Calgary and nestles in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. It is a new venue for the event although it was built in 1980’s and designed by Bill Newis. The facility was the venue for the 1999 Du Maurier event, a then major on the LPGA Tour and in which Karrie Webb was victorious that year.
Not surprisingly the tournament has attracted all ten of the leading players in the Rolex World Rankings, the significant prizemoney of US$2.75 million making it one of the more lucrative on the LPGA Tour.
Lorena Ochoa has struggled for much of the last four months recording only one top ten in her last seven starts which, by her standards, is difficult to comprehend. She is a previous winner of the event having won in 2007 but she needs to turn things around quickly if she is to be a factor this week.
Ochoa has been at the top of the female game for the past 124 weeks and while she still holds a comfortable lead she is not the dominant player she was four months ago.
Yani Tseng is the world number two but like Ochoa her game has lost some of its gloss in the last couple of months. She is a brilliant player however and could well turn it all around this week.
Suzann Pettersen could be the player to do best this week. She finished runner up last week to M.J. Hur and although she has not won this season she has been three times runner up and that elusive victory must be close at hand.
Cristie Kerr is another playing well at present and although Ji Yai Shin falls into a similar category as Ochoa and Tseng in that her recent form is not great although she is too good a player to dismiss.
The Australians in the field are the defending champion Hull, Karrie Webb, Lindsey Wright, Rachel Hetherington, Sarah Kemp, Sarah Jane Smith and Anna Rawson.
