Life On And After The LPGA Tour

Forbes Business SportsMoney Life On And After The LPGA Tour Candace Oehler Contributor Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own. I write about interesting people in the worlds of baseball and golf. Following Oct 8, 2023, 03:26pm EDT | Press play to listen to this article! Got it! Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin LaRee Sugg continues her trailblazing career.

PART 2 LaRee Sugg at the driving range at Newport Country Club, site of the 2006 U. S. Women’s Open in .

. . [+] Newport, Rhode Island, June 29.

Fog delayed first-round play until Friday. (Photo by A. Messerschmidt/Getty Images) *** Local Caption *** WireImage NCAA All-American golfer LaRee Sugg graduated from UCLA in 1991, with a bachelor’s degree and an LPGA dream.

She was accustomed to success at all levels, from junior through collegiate golf, despite the pressure she shouldered as the only Black female golfer in competition. However, it took three attempts at Qualifying (Q) School to earn her LPGA Tour card the first time (she would go through Q School a total of 10 times in her career) and take her place as just the third Black golfer with full Tour membership. LaRee vividly remembers Q School as a brutal, two-stage process of 72-hole Tournaments, with large fields of talented, hopeful golfers whose hopes are dashed at each stage.

Ever-optimistic, LaRee wasn’t discouraged after her first two attempts, but rather opted to explore the world, playing professionally on the Futures, European and Asian Tours in between Q School tries. “I’m glad I didn’t get my card right away. ,” she admitted.

“I’m not unhappy with that because I dreamed about travel and I really enjoyed my experiences playing in Europe, Australia, Asia. That was a great consolation prize. ” MORE FOR YOU WWE Fastlane 2023 Results: Winners And Grades As Jade Cargill Appears U S Dollar Collapse Shock 8 Trillion Predicted Fed Inflation Flip To Spark A Critical Bitcoin Ethereum XRP And Crypto Price Boom To Rival Gold To Dodge Russian Missiles, Ukraine’s U.

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When she earned her coveted Tour card in 1995, she became a member of the oldest professional women’s sports organization in the U. S. (founded in 1950) and the first Black golfer since Renee Powell retired in 1981, a 14-year gap.

“The first 50 years, they had just three of us on the LPGA,” she said almost incredulously, referring to her predecessors Althea Gibson and Powell. “We were the exception instead of the rule; and it shouldn’t be acceptable to be the exception. ” Life on Tour As the only Black golfer on the LPGA Tour, LaRee felt “mostly” welcomed but also lonely, recalling that she would often go weeks without seeing someone who looked like her.

Any racism she experienced was more subtle than overt, for example, often being singled out in tournament parking lots, and always knowing she had to have her golf bag and Tour identification visible to prove she belonged there. She recalled, “I never experienced any negativity from fans, though, and this was small compared to what I knew Black athletes like Althea and Renee went through. ” LaRee was proud to be the face of LPGA diversity, and she gladly complied with every request from interviews to junior clinics.

As the only Black LPGA member, she was not able to just get her bearings and fly under the radar like most rookies. Instead, she was conspicuously up front and visible every week for 30 weeks, making it difficult to concentrate on her job. “It was always extra weight I had to carry, but it was so much harder for people that came before me,” she said.

“Whatever pressure I felt was not comparable to what they went through. I didn’t look at obstacles, I looked at the path ahead. ” In retrospect, however, she questions how much those extra commitments affected her golf game.

“It’s almost like I was thrust into things,” she said candidly. “I had expectations that were put on me before my game had grown into them. I couldn’t really enjoy those small successes along the way because knew I was carrying the torch.

I felt honored, proud and blessed to be in that position, but now I do wonder how much better I might have been. ” She enjoyed a very respectable four-year LPGA career that spanned 1995-1996, and 2000-2001. It included multiple appearances at the U.

S. Women’s Open and Women’s British Open, and she notched a victory at the 1998 Aurora Health Care Futures Classic. She also placed in the top five at the 1993 Singapore Ladies Open and 1997 Indonesian Ladies Open.

New Chapters LaRee Sugg. athletics administrator at University of Richmond. Courtesy of LaRee Sugg After 10 years as a professional, LaRee accepted the challenge of establishing and coaching a women’s golf team at the University of Richmond (VA) a small, private, Division 1 (D1) school.

It was not on her career Bingo card, but she jumped at the chance to introduce competitive collegiate golf to women in Virginia. “I needed a reset, but didn’t know what was next,” she recalled. “My grandfather had been a professor and a coach.

I put it out in the universe that I was thinking about coaching; talked to some people and they said Richmond was starting a program. A week later I was coaching. ” After three years learning the ropes, she was offered a move into athletic administration as the Senior Woman Administrator (SWA).

In 2008, she undertook her current position as deputy director of athletics for policy and sports management / SWA / and chief of Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI). She described her path as on the job training, explaining, “I feel like I was the last generation of administrators that went out of coaching the natural way; now a lot of young people go to grad school to be a coach or athletic administrator. I came in based on life experience.

” Student-athlete diversity has increased during her tenure. “I love Richmond and the impact I can make at a small school. I’m proud we have had a number of African American players come to our school.

There have been at least 4-5 women golfers, some Hispanics, and a Black male golfer. ” The Tour Today LaRee follows the LPGA closely and notes that diversity is still sorely lacking. As a matter of fact, it was a full nine years after she left the Tour that Shasta Averyhardt became just the fourth Black member.

To date, there has been a not-so-grand total of eight Black LPGA Tour members – Althea Gibson, Renee Powell, LaRee Sugg, Shasta Averyhardt, Cheyenne Woods, Sadena Parks, Ginger Howard and Mariah Stackhouse. Of those eight, only Mariah is currently playing on Tour. The issues faced by the LPGA appear daunting at times.

LaRee described the Tour as a barometer of the national economy and vulnerable to what happens in corporate America. When the economy drops, so does tournament sponsorship. In order to attract more diversity on Tour, she insisted that golf needs to be a champion and invest in strategic ways to give opportunities to Black golfers in specific ways.

“The teaching division does an amazing job of grass roots work, as do programs like First Tee and AJGA” she said. “Now I see mountains of kids playing golf. But that only takes you to a certain point.

What happens after that? They get you hooked but then you get hit with the financial club. ” She would love to see an LPGA subsidy program similar to the Earnings Assistance Program established by the PGA. Fully-exempt PGA players are guaranteed a minimum of $500,000 per season and draw it against their earnings throughout the year.

Along those same lines, she proposed the idea of a check for every golfer in the field. “What if there was no cut, everyone who shows up gets a check?,” she asked. “That would change the trajectory of how long women could play golf.

You have to give people opportunity to make money. ” And finally, according to LaRee, we must look at the devaluation of women’s sports at all levels of the industry – the fact that players, coaches, anyone who’s working in the women’s sports arena is making less than in men’s sports. “One thing that might save us is if women become a valuable commodity,” she insisted.

Welcome to the Hall LaRee Sugg inducted into National Black Golf Hall of Fame in September 2023. Courtesy National Black Golf Hall of Fame LaRee was one of four members inducted into the National Black Golf Hall of Fame at their 37 th anniversary celebration in September, 2023. It is surprising that it took so long for her trailblazing career to receive the recognition it deserves.

At 53, married, mother of a 14-year old son, and carrying the responsibilities of a college administrator, she doesn’t have much free time left for golf. But shades of that competitive six-year old in spiked saddle shoes are front and center during recreational family golf outings (her husband is a PGA Professional at Pinehurst). Her bucket list includes qualifying for a USGA Senior Open, and it would certainly be no surprise it she makes the field.

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