This year marks the seventh anniversary of the LPGA Bank of Hope Founder’s Cup, a professional event hosted every year in Phoenix, AZ. The tournament was created to celebrate how far women have come in golf, bridging the gap between honoring the past accomplishments of the 13 original LPGA Founders and golf’s female pioneers and celebrating the new wave of talent on the LPGA Tour.
Thinking back to my experience as a gangly, ten-year-old girl of color playing golf, I’m proud to see the young women of today stepping boldly onto the golf course rather than feeling like they never truly belonged despite knowing their way around the golf course. We have the trailblazing women in golf to thank for setting profound change in motion.
Just a few decades ago, these same women faced opposition at every turn from the widely held belief that women were physically unfit to play golf and that their very presence on the golf course was distracting. They drove cross-country, hosting their own tournaments and competing for purses half the size of their male counterparts just for the chance that they might leave the golf world better than they found it for a future generation of girls and women.
This Women’s History Month, we celebrate these and other women who are working every day to grow the game of golf and leave behind a legacy to be proud of.
Join us in learning their stories, sharing them with the people you know, and paying homage to the fearless women who have steadily dismantled the status quo and left an immeasurable legacy for the generations behind them.
Your’s in golf,
Great article and well said. Much respect to those who paved the way. There are so many young women who never think to pick up a club and may have tons of raw talent but won’t know because they weren’t introduced to the game…that has changed so much thanks to the courageous women of the LPGA.
My observation has been that so many women golfers do not follow the LPGA or Legends. They watch the men’s golf. I try to spread the word as much as possible and let time know how exciting women’s golf can’t be.