AUGUSTA, GEORGIA | England’s Lottie Woad went Arnold Palmer mode to win the fifth Augusta National Women’s Amateur.
Woad – a 20-year-old Florida State all-American from Farnham, southwest of London – birdied three of the last four holes at Augusta National Golf Club, including 17 and 18, to win by one shot over Bailey Shoemaker of Southern Cal on Saturday. The leader after the first 36 holes at nearby Champions Retreat rallied from two down with four to play to post 69 and finish at 8-under-par 208. She was the only player in the ANWA field to shoot all three rounds under par.
“I was hoping it was going to be like a nice stress-free day, but it was far from that,” Woad said. “In the end, it’s a cooler way to finish.”
As cool as it gets, actually. Arnold Palmer in 1960 was the first player to birdie the 17th and 18th holes to walk off a winner at the Masters by one stroke – a feat that was matched by Mark O’Meara in 1998. Woad’s King-like late charge was a portrait in poise.
“I was prepared for someone to go low,” said Woad, who started with a two-shot lead. “When I ended up being two back, I was like, ‘OK, so I’ve got these birdie chances that they have.’ Just gave myself the chances at the end and luckily holed some putts. …
“If I’d been told before this week that I’d be two back with four to play, I would have been like, ‘Yeah, perfect; that sounds great.’ To be in the mix on the back nine at Augusta is something that everyone dreams about. So I was trying to really embrace it. I didn’t really have anything to lose at that point.”
Lottie Woad
Woad drained a 12-footer to birdie the par-5 15th to spark her rally after falling two back with a “really bad” bogey on No. 13. She had to dig deep with two more birdies to beat Shoemaker, who posted an historic round of her own on Saturday with an ANWA-record 6-under 66 at Augusta.
The rally, however, nearly failed to launch after Woad’s drive hit a pine tree on 14 and she was in jeopardy of coughing up another stroke that she knew might be lethal to her hopes. But she eked in a 10-footer to save par and keep hope alive.
“I felt like the three birdies I got were probably not as important as my par save on 14 because I think if I’d gone three back at that point, it would have been pretty difficult to get that back,” Woad said. “I knew even being 215 [yards] from the pin, two back, if I could somehow make par, I was still in it. But if I made bogey there, I was definitely out of it.”
After a birdie from 10 feet at 17 drew her square with Shoemaker, Woad wasn’t thinking of simply getting it in the house for a playoff.
“I was honestly just thinking about making birdie rather than par,” she said. “I knew I needed par for the playoff, but the pin was such a nice pin that I knew I could use that backstop a little bit.”
Her 9-iron settled about 15 feet above the hole, and she rolled in the double-breaker for the win.
Shoemaker, who’d missed the cut in her two previous ANWA starts, started the day four back of Woad and commenced on a nearly perfect round – a bogey-free 66 to set the clubhouse mark at 7-under. The 66 is the lowest tournament round any woman has shot at Augusta National, beating the 5-under 67 that Jennifer Kupcho fired in the final round to win the inaugural ANWA in 2019.
“I can putt, but that’s about it,” Shoemaker said of her game, understating the quality of the shots she hit to get there but certainly proving her point with deft reads and perfect touch all day on Augusta National’s greens with birdies at 2, 5, 7, 11, 13 and 16.
After waiting more than an hour to see if her score would hold up, Shoemaker had nothing but praise for Woad’s overtaking finish.
“Good for her,” Shoemaker said. “Especially under pressure, knowing she had to do it, that’s amazing. That’s awesome. I think super clutch.
“I’m obviously disappointed, but at the end of the day, I played about as good as I could have. Maybe a couple of putts could have dropped. But I made just about everything, too. It is what it is.”
Sweden’s Ingrid Lindblad, the world No. 1 female amateur and an LSU graduate student, shot 69 to finish 4-under and post her third top-three finish in four ANWA starts.
“I feel every time I come in here, I just have a smile on my face,” Lindblad said. “It doesn’t matter how it goes. You’re happy to be here. It’s such an amazing experience and a test for your golf game, for sure.”
Woad took up golf at age 7 at Farnham Golf Club, learning from the same local club pro who is still her swing coach. She was inspired watching the first ANWA on television and aspired to be good enough to qualify one day even though she was “pretty far off getting to it” when she was 14.
Now she’s an ANWA champion, with open doors to several LPGA majors starting in two weeks at the Chevron Championship.
“I was trying to not think about what kind of came with it when I was playing, but now … it’s pretty cool, what I’m going to be able to play in this summer, and it was one of the goals this year. …
“It means a lot. It’s what I want to do. I want to be a professional and to be playing in these events. To get this experience so early on is going to be great for me. I haven’t played in a major before. I think I’ve played in a couple of pro events, but never like an LPGA event. So this is going to be really exciting for me.”
SCORING
Scott Michaux