David Davies heralds the arrival of Se Ri Pak, golfing phenomenon, for the British Women’s Open at Lytham St Annes
The golfing world breathed a gentle sigh of relief when Brandie Burton won, or perhaps more to the point Se Ri Pak did not win, the Du Maurier Classic in Canada at the start of this month. It was almost inaudible but it was there – pure, unadulterated relief that a more natural order of things had been reinstated.
For had Pak won it would have meant that a 20-year-old Korean, in her first season on the women’s tour in the United States, had succeeded in three major championships in a row – or every major championship in which she had played.
As it is, Pak, the winner of the McDonald’s Ladies’ Professional Golfing Association (LPGA) Championship and the US Women’s Open, has won only two out of three. As a rookie she was not eligible to play in the first major of the season, the Dinah Shore in March.
But by taking consecutive majors – labelled, naturally, Pak-to-Pak wins – she has announced herself in the most dramatic fashion possible. There have been records galore: the youngest US Women’s Open champion ever; the youngest to win two majors in a season; a four-round total of 261, set while winning the Jamie Farr Classic, that was four strokes lower than the record aggregate for an LPGA event; and a round of 61, the lowest in LPGA history.
“Forget Tiger,” said Colleen Walker, who won the du Maurier last year. “Se Ri is the real phenomenon.” Certainly she has, in just over half a season, already won more majors than Woods in his 13 attempts. Had she won the Du Maurier she would have won as many majors as Nancy Lopez in 21 years on the circuit.
The last player to win two majors in a season on the LPGA tour was Laura Davies, in 1996. The Englishwoman has had a quiet time in the US this year but recognises a star when she sees one.
“I’ve tasted being one of the top players,” Davies says, “and I’d like to be one of the feared players again. At the moment, when my name goes on the leaderboard no one cares – they probably figure that I’ll do something wrong and fall off. But with Se Ri, you just count down the holes until she catches you.”
The emergence of Pak as, inevitably, the leader of the pack, is one of the more astounding sports stories of our time. There is no great tradition of golf in South Korea and, although she was introduced to the sport in the conventional way – by her father Joon Chul Pak – he is not a conventional figure. He has been linked with the Korean equivalent of the Mafia and at one point had to leave home hurriedly to live in Hawaii.
He ran a construction business in Taejon, 160km south of Seoul, and in July this year it was reported in the Shisa Journal, a weekly newspaper, that “Joon Chulpak, who was a member of the underworld in Taejon City, fled to Hawaii in 1988 when the police began clamping down on organised crime.” Joon himself says, through an interpreter: “To be honest, I was a thug in the past. I have lived a tough life.” He has the scars on his stomach, from stab wounds, to prove it.
But this unlikely figure was also a golfer, one good enough to represent Taejon in national events in Korea, and when, as little girls and boys will, Pak asked if she could have a go, Daddy was naturally pleased. Half an hour later he was both surprised and delighted.
“She could grip the club perfectly and she could hit shots,” he said. “She could get the ball airborne.” Like Earl Woods, Joon Chul-pak quickly decided that he had a talent on his hands; again like Earl, he decided on some unusual, not to say controversial, ways of developing it.
In The New York Times, Ira Berkow relates one such method. Chul-pak decided that he wanted Pak to be brave and to that end he took her to a local cemetery several times to camp out overnight. Having erected the tent and told the girl, barely in her teens, “I won’t let the ghosts get you”, he left her there.
One night, when he returned, Pak said: “I’m warm here”, and her father knew that she had learned to live with her fears. They never went again.
Years later, when the pressure came on in golf tournaments, Pak, in her still-developing English, would say: “I have no nervous.”
Chul-pak also made her practise every day, even during the severe Korean winters that were often so cold that icicles formed in her hair. He says now: “My wife was worried that I would kill Se Ri, and for what – golf, a game that is not so popular in Korea. But I knew she could be a great player.”
She began to prove this in Korea. As an amateur she won 30 tournaments, turned professional in 1996 and of the 14 events she played won six and came second in seven. Not too many people noticed, although to their great credit the multinational company Samsung did, and signed her up.
By now Chul-pak had decided that he had taught his daughter all that he could, and determined that her future lay in the US. All he needed was someone to further her golfing education, and someone to pay the bills. He turned to David Leadbetter, golf’s most renowned instructor, who agreed to help for a year, and he also turned to Samsung, who agreed to cover all the costs – including his own.
“It’s not something I normally do,” says Leadbetter of the arrangement in which Pak took a condominium at his home club of Lake Nona in Orlando, Florida. “I’m just not at the club often enough. But I knew straight away that if I couldn’t get her to be a world-beater, then I wasn’t very good at my job.
“For me, it was love at first swing. It’s not that it was a perfect swing, but it had that intangible quality about it. The sound of the ball off the club face was like that of the male tour players.
“Pak has effortless power, just like Sam Snead. There are a lot of similarities in that regard to Ernie Els, who hits it miles without seeming to try. Pak is very, very long and yet she plays within herself. It comes naturally.”
Ask Leadbetter what Pak’s strengths are and the answer – “she has no weaknesses” – is something of a clich. But there is nothing that the Korean does less than well, and her length plus her skill out of bunkers are exceptional.
“During the winter I had some European Tour players visit Lake Nona,” says Leadbetter, “and they were dumbfounded when they saw her hitting balls out of the sand.”
Gary Player is acknowledged as having been the best bunker player of all time, but when Leadbetter saw him at the Open Championship at Royal Birkdale this year he teased him that he knew of someone better – and that she was a woman.
During her schooldays in Korea, when not playing golf, Pak was a hurdler and a shot-putter. “Quite a combination,” says Leadbetter. “It’s made her very strong, and very flexible. She’s also got a great work ethic. She just wants to hit balls all day and we’ve had to tone her down a bit because of the danger of tendinitis.”
Leadbetter is now a believer. His fee for the first 12 months was $120E000. Now, for the second year, in recognition of an outstanding talent, it is half that.
When Pak earned her Tour card she set herself the incredible target of not just winning a tournament, but winning five. When the McDonald’s Championship came along she had not won even one, and this was to be her first major.
“I told her,” says Leadbetter, “that this was a course that would suit her. It was very long and Laura Davies had won on it.” Pak duly won, took the US Open as well, then the Jamie Farr and the Giant Eagle Classics.
Leadbetter has no hesitation in saying: “I think she’s going to dominate. She’s only been in the top 10 four times this year and each of those has been a win. When she gets into the hunt, she changes gear. I’ve told her that she will have to re- arrange her target. She’ll have to win eight times this year; that’s her new goal.”
When Pak won the US Open, in a sudden- death play-off against the 20-year-old amateur and Curtis Cup player Jenny Chuasiriporn (Shuh-seer-uh-porn), both players were on what was to be the final green in two shots. It was Chuasiriporn to go first, with a 6m downhill putt that had a double break.
As he contemplated the situation Johnny Miller, in the commentary tower, offered the thought that “this championship is gonna be decided by a mistake. The pressure is just too great .” Chuasiriporn proceeded to hit a wonderful putt that shaved the hole and just failed to drop.
Now Pak had a 5m, straight, uphill for a birdie and the win.
She hit it hard, she hit it on line and as it disappeared into the hole, Miller’s words disappeared down his throat.
It is hard to blame the commentator. He did not know about the ghosts in the cemetery, he did not know about the icicles and he did not know that here was one golfer who, when she says “I have no nervous”, really, really means it.
ENDS