With Little Fear, 12-Year-Old Wie Sets Lofty Goals

Sunriver, Ore. – Michelle Wie, like any 12 year old, has a couple of fears. “I can’t surf, I’m too scared,” said the Honolulu youngster, “and, I’m afraid of heights.” That’s about all that frightens her.

After qualifying for match play Wednesday at the 26th U.S. Women’s Amateur Public Links Championship with 79-71—150, 7 over par, the eighth-grader discussed her other goals.

She plans to qualify for the U.S. Amateur Championship, (that’s the men’s amateur) and she wants to win the U.S. Amateur Public Links Championship, (again, the men’s version). The A.P.L. title, she explained to a small but startled audience, is the only way she can play in The Masters.

“My lifetime goal is to play in The Masters and the Public Links is the only avenue,” she said. “I’ll try every year.”

She’ll have to begin next year. This year’s APL qualifying conflicted with WAPL qualifying.

Wie’s soft voice and frequent giggles belie the seriousness of her intentions. Since her first USGA championship, when she qualified for the 2000 U.S. Women’s Amateur Public Links at the age of 10, she has announced that she wants to play on the PGA Tour.

Most observers wouldn’t be surprised if her dreams come true. Wie plays heady golf and in school carries a 3.9 grade point average. One inch shy of 6 feet tall, she regularly hits her longest tee shots 300 yards. In a recent tournament in Hawaii where drives were measured, she averaged 277 yards on the measured holes, and she was driving with a 4-wood.

Her prodigious length would make some current professionals, those who complained of not being able to carry the rough at the U.S. Open’s 10th hole last week, somewhat more than envious of a 12-year-old girl.

But Wie never whines – not about tough courses, or challenges, or insurmountable odds. Nothing, to Wie, is impossible, even if she was "female at birth."

That clause is part of the USGA entry standards for its women’s national championships. No such standards show up on the entry blanks for the U.S. Open, U.S. Amateur, U.S. Amateur Public Links, or the USGA Senior Amateur. The USGA's position is that women can play in those events, as well as their own championships, if they qualify.

Not too difficult, according to Wie. “It’s still the same game,” she said. “You have to have a lower score than the other people.”

Getting in The Masters is a bit trickier. While the U.S. Amateur Public Links champion receives an invitation to walk the hallowed fairways in The Masters, it is Augusta National Golf Club that issues those invitations, not the USGA.

Don't count Wie out yet. In February, she qualified for the LPGA Takefuji Classic despite 10 penalty strokes, with a birdie on the final hole. Earlier this year, she became the only woman to ever qualify for Hawaii’s Manoa Cup, a prestigious match-play event. Wie won her first match, then lost to the highly-rated Del-mark Fugita, but took Fugita to the 20th hole before she lost.

In the Hawaii Amateur, another men’s event, she fired rounds of 75-80 on a Pearl Country Club course that was set up, she said, at around 7,000 yards long.

Wie began playing at the age of five and “kinda” remembers hitting a driver some 100 yards. That first year, her tee shots began carrying a fence in her father Byung Wook Wie’s homemade practice area and he began taking his daughter to a driving range.

As a youngster, a younger youngster, she played baseball and soccer, swam and enjoyed ballet and piano, but golf eventually shouldered aside her other interests.

Wie’s parents, her father who is known as “B.J.” and is a professor of transportation at the University of Hawaii, and her mother, Hyun Kyong, who works in real estate, are from Korea and have lived in Hawaii for 15 years.

At the age of 10, Wie set her first national record when, at the age of 10 years, nine months, and 24 days, she became the youngest competitor in the history of a USGA women’s amateur championship. That year, she qualified for the 2000 U.S. Women’s Amateur Public Links Championship, easily advancing to match play.

While she lost in the first round, she played better in the 2001 championship. In a noteworthy upset, Wie defeated Hilary Homeyer, a U.S. Curtis Cup and Women’s World Amateur Team member in the second round, 1 up. Wie then lost in the third round to Allison Johnson, of Amarillo, Texas, 1 up.

Learning more every year, Wie’s immediate goal is clearly to win the Women’s Amateur Public Links Championship and the wall of her bedroom in Honolulu is bedecked with banners from her two previous attempts. After Tuesday’s final qualifying round, and her even-par score of 71, Wie was clearly pleased as she advanced into match play.

“Golf was funner today,” she said.

And once again, the girl who dreams of one day being Women’s Amateur Public Links champion, the U.S. Amateur champion, and The Masters champion, sounded 12 years old.

This story was written by Rhonda Glenn, USGA.