LPGA
The Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) is an American organization for female golfers. The organization is headquartered at the LPGA International in Daytona Beach, Florida, and is best known for running the LPGA Tour, a series of weekly golf tournaments for elite women professional golfers from around the world.
This article is about the golf association. For the political party, see Libertarian Party of Georgia.Sport
1950
13 original LPGA players[3]
United States, with events in other countries around the world
Kathy Whitworth (88)
Organization and history[edit]
Other "LPGAs" exist in other countries, each with a geographical designation in its name, but the U.S. organization is the first, largest, and most prestigious. The LPGA is also an organization for female club and teaching professionals. This is different from the PGA Tour, which runs the main professional tours in the U.S. and, since 1968, has been independent of the club and teaching professionals' organization, the PGA of America.
The LPGA also administers an annual qualifying school similar to that conducted by the PGA Tour. Depending on a golfer's finish in the final qualifying tournament, she may receive full or partial playing privileges on the LPGA Tour. In addition to the main LPGA Tour, the LPGA also owns and operates the Epson Tour, formerly the Futures Tour, the official developmental tour of the LPGA. Top finishers at the end of each season on that tour receive playing privileges on the main LPGA Tour for the following year.
The LPGA is the oldest continuing women's professional sports organization in the United States.[4][5] It succeeded the WPGA (Women's Professional Golf Association), which was founded in 1944 but stopped its limited tour after the 1948 season and officially ceased operations in December 1949.[6] The WPGA was founded by Ellen Griffin, Betty Hicks, and Hope Seignious.[7][8]
The LPGA was founded in 1950 at Rolling Hills Country Club in Wichita, Kansas.[9] Its 13 founders were: Alice Bauer, Patty Berg, Bettye Danoff, Helen Dettweiler, Marlene Hagge, Helen Hicks, Opal Hill, Betty Jameson, Sally Sessions, Marilynn Smith, Shirley Spork, Louise Suggs, and Babe Zaharias.[10][11] Patty Berg was its first president.[11] The founders were elected to the World Golf Hall of Fame as a group in 2023 though six had already been inducted individually.[12]
The first LPGA tournament was the 1950 Tampa Women's Open, held at Palma Ceia Golf and Country Club in Tampa, Florida. Ironically, the winner was amateur Polly Riley, who beat the stellar field of professional founders.[13]
In 1956, the LPGA hosted its first tournament outside the United States at the Havana Open in Havana, Cuba.
In 1996, Muffin Spencer-Devlin became the first LPGA player to come out as gay.[14]
In 2001, Jane Blalock's JBC Marketing established the Women's Senior Golf Tour, now called the Legends Tour, for women professionals aged 45 and older. This is affiliated with the LPGA, but is not owned by the LPGA.
Since 2006, the LPGA has played a season-ending championship tournament.
Michael Whan became the eighth commissioner of the LPGA in October 2009, succeeding the ousted Carolyn Bivens.[5][15] Whan is a former marketing executive in the sporting goods industry.[16]
After a lawsuit filed by golfer Lana Lawless, the rules were changed in 2010 to allow transgender competitors.[17][18][19] In 2013, trans woman Bobbi Lancaster faced local scorn for attempting playing in Arizona's Cactus Tour and attempting to qualify in the LPGA Qualifying Tournament.[20]
In 2018, the LPGA acquired an amateur golf association, the Executive Women's Golf Association (EWGA), and expanded its emphasis to include amateur golfers in the U.S. and North America. Initially called the LPGA Women Who Play,[21] the amateur organization was rebranded as the LPGA Amateur Golf Association. The LPGA Amateur Golf Association has member-operated chapters throughout North America and the Caribbean.[22]
Prize money and tournaments[edit]
In 2010, total official prize money on the LPGA Tour was $41.4 million, a decrease of over $6 million from 2009. In 2010 there were 24 official tournaments, down from 28 in 2009 and 34 in 2008. Despite the loss in total tournaments, the number of tournaments hosted outside of the United States in 2010 stayed the same, as all four lost tournaments had been hosted in the United States. By 2016, the number of tournaments had risen to 33 with a record-high total prize money in excess of $63 million. In 2019, a new record was set with total prize money amounting to $70.5 million (a rise of over $5 million in one year).[23]
International presence[edit]
In its first four decades, the LPGA Tour was dominated by American players. Sandra Post of Canada became the first player living outside the United States to gain an LPGA tour card in 1968. The non-U.S. contingent is now very large. The last time an American player topped the money list was in 2014 (Stacy Lewis), the last time an American led the tour in tournaments won was in 2020 (Danielle Kang), and from 2000 through 2009, non-Americans won 31 of 40 major championships.
Particularly, one of the notable trends seen in the early 21st century in the LPGA is the rise and dominance of Korean golfers.[24] Se Ri Pak's early success in the LPGA sparked the boom in Korean women golfers on the LPGA Tour.[25] In 2009, there were 122 non-Americans from 27 countries on the tour, including 47 from South Korea, 14 from Sweden, 10 from Australia, eight from the United Kingdom (four from England, three from Scotland and one from Wales), seven from Canada, five from Taiwan, and four from Japan.[26]
Hall of Fame[edit]
The LPGA established the Hall of Fame of Women's Golf in 1951, with four charter members: Patty Berg, Betty Jameson, Louise Suggs, and Babe Zaharias. After being inactive for several years, the Hall of Fame moved in 1967 to its first physical premises, in Augusta, Georgia, and was renamed the LPGA Tour Hall of Fame. In 1998 it merged into the World Golf Hall of Fame.
The LPGA Tour presents several annual awards. Three are awarded in competitive contests, based on scoring over the course of the year.
American golfer Nancy Lopez, in 1978, is the only player to win all three awards in the same season. Lopez was also the Tour's top money earner that season.