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Teen idle
While the game enjoys its biggest boom, young girls are an audience that persistently remains on the outside not looking in. by david shefter
Ashley Kent cannot ignore golf. The 11-year-old lives in a private course community in Wilmington, N C. Her parents have a membership at The Country Club of Landfall. Each summer, she participates in the club’s one-week junior golf day camp, where the kids receive instruction and the opportunity to play at week’s end.
Kent enjoys the camp and has shown enough ability and etiquette to earn limited playing privi leges. But she does not play golf on a regular basis. “It takes too much time,” she says. “Golf is such a slow sport. You hit the ball and then you walk or take the cart to play your next shot.”
Especially when compared to her favorite activity: soccer. She plays that sport virtually year-round, drawn by its action, team concept and the intangibles that hook young girls such as Kent from an early age.
Soccer possesses one other key element: a female role model. Mia Hamm has become as big a star in her sport as Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods are in theirs. Successes by U.S. women in the Olympic Games and World Cup have added to the growing interest in women’s soccer. In Wilmington alone, more than 1,200 of the 3,200 or so youths involved in the area’s soccer program are girls, the largest numbers ever for that group.
“Tiger Woods has done for boys [and golf] what Mia Hamm has done for girls’ soccer,” says Miriam Kent, Ashley’s mom.
“I think if there was more promotion [for women's golf] there would be more girls playing.”
Attracting Ashley Kent and other girls to golf is one of the greatest challenges the game faces at a time when unprecedented attention is being paid to juniors. In the three decades since Title IX legislation was passed in the U.S to broaden academic and athletic opportunities for women, participation has exploded in many sports, leaving golf in the dust (see chart below). The game now has the difficult task of breaking a cycle seemingly working a.yaii ist it at all levels:
- The motor skills it requires are difficult to master for the youngest kids, who are increasingly drawn to activities that involve running and jumping.
- It is deemed socially uninteresting for pre-teens and teens, who gravitate toward team activities that have greater social opportunities during practice and competition.
- Participation numbers are lagging at the high school level and, as a result, col lege scholarships are increasingly going to international players.
- Foreign stars such as Se Ri Рак of Korea, Annika Sorenstam of Sweden and Karrie Webb of Australia dominate the top level of the game, minimizing the presence of U S. role models who might bolster participation in this country.
The game’s leaders are taking notice. One theme of this autumn’s third Golf 20/20 conference, a gathering of dozens of representatives from all segments of the game, will be an examination of women’s participation in the game. In mid-March, LPGA players attended a mandatory weekend player summit during which commissioner Ту Votaw outlined a five-year business plan to help the organization to attract fans “in the increasingly competitive world of sports entertainment”
These questions have risen at a time when Woods’s popularity has brought unprecedented attention to golf in the non-sports press. No matter that it was one of the first professional sports available to women, and that the U.S. Women’s Amateur Championship was first played the same year as the U.S. Amateur and Open. So far, that tradition and efforts to nurture juniors have run into difficulties at the grass-roots level, where girls and young women can play everything from lacrosse to ice hockey, with pro leagues a possibility in basketball, soccer, Softball and volleyball.
“We’re competing with soccer, we’re competing with lacrosse,” says Paula-Brzostowski, director of women’s golf at the Carolinas Golf Association and a college golfer in the late 1980s. “Soccer is such a hot sport in our state. Back then we did one thing; now everyone is into multiple sports. Basketball, volleyball and soccer are just humongous.”
When the U.S. Women’s Open was played in 2001 at North Carolina’s Pine Needles Lodge & GC, local organizers planned to boost golf’s visibility by offering a exhibition match featuring former Women’s Open champions Laura Davdes, Juli Inkster and Betsy King and three professional soccer players. Many of the young girls instead gravitated to Hamm, eagerly seeking an autograph or a simple hello.
“That [other sports' popularity] has hurt golf a lot,” says Doreen Greenberg, a professor at Stockton College of New Jersey and a certified consultant in sports psychology. “A lot [of the perception] has to do with the media… Publicity and exposure really helps. But I think there are enough young golfers out there that can appeal to girls.”
But girls may not find exposure to those role models through television. The LPGA’s first major of 2002, the Kraft Nabisco, was broadcast almost exclusively on cable. Ratings for the final day increased 83 percent from last year but that still left them a paltry 2.2.
One sore point for U.S. golf fans is the low number of home-grown winners on the LPGA. Only 10 of 36 victories last year — and not a single major championship —and three of the first seven this season went to U.S. players.
“We need some dynamic American players,” says Stephen Ham-blin, who oversees the American Junior Golf Association, the country’s most visible junior circuit, which counts 880 girls among its more than 5,000 members.
“Soccer is very organized,” Hamblin says with a wistful tone in his voice. “They have uniforms, organized practices and games right from the start. They go from that to select teams. They are moving you up the ladder very quickly.”
Hamlin’s own children bear witness to the allure of soccer. One of his four daughters started playing the sport before she entered kindergarten, with a coed team through a church. She loved it.
“I never dreamed about starting my kids in golf at the age of 5,” says Hamlin. “Golf is behind the eight ball as far as competing with other sports.”
Soccer skills are easier for you t inters to grasp. Running and kicking a ball seem far simpler than the distance and direction control required to hit a golf ball toward a distant target or worrying about how many strokes it takes.
Dr. Vern Seefeldt, director emeritus for the Institute for the Study of Youth Sports at Michigan State University, conducted a 31- year study that identified 30 fundamental motor skills and then gauged the success of teaching those skills to children as young as 4.
“Soccer and basketball allow [the youngest] children to engage in an activity which is inherently joyful to them, namely, anaerobic running,” Seefeldt says. “Just running up and down the field makes the children feel that they are participating in a socially acceptable way with their friends.”
Running is hardly an acceptable part of golf. To compound matters, Seefeldt did not find success in teaching the more technical aspects of golf or tennis until kids reached age 10.
“Popular skills like running, jumping and kicking contribute to the popularity of these sports,” says Seefeldt. “Golf and tennis lack the ingredients that seem to propel soccer and basketball to popularity. The golf grip and swing are not natural to children.”
Seefeldt notes that for his study, kids were provided with a “relatively boring driving range and equipment” — not unlike what is available at some junior programs. The study might have seen different results, he notes, using apar-3 course. But Seefeldt believes thai lack of perceived success and a stimulating social environment, especially among girls, were the reasons most frequently given for their disinterest.
So what can be done to entice more young girls to play? One solution is a program founded in 1989 by Sandy LaBauve, aprofessional based in Scotts-dale, Ariz. She realized that in order to teach girls she not only had to make the game fun but also socially acceptable.
“You have to nurture girls and let them know that it’s okay to make a mistake,” says LaBauve, who points out that team sports allow individual mistakes to be covered up more easily. “That softens the blow. You have to have stepping stones and not put girls in a competitive situation before they are ready.”
LaBauve’s local success led to a 1994 national initiative sponsored by the LPGA and later supported by the Girl Scouts and USGA What sets this program apart is that it’s exclusive to girls from age 7 to 17. By the end of 2002, the LPGA and USGA hope to have 107 sites with about 3,200 participants. Nancy Lopez and fellow LPGA players Dottie Pepper, Jen Hanna and Terry-Jo Myers have joined as national spokeswomen.
The goal of the LPGA USGA Girls Golf Clubs, as the program is now known, is to stress fun while teaching fundamentals at a minimal cost to the participants. The absence of boys eliminates potential intimidation. Girls are divided into five levels, from novices to those with competitive experience.
It has worked wonders in many locations. Teaching pro Carole Tessicini was pleasantly surprised at the turnout last year in Coronado, Calif Her goal for the club was 30 girls; more than 60 came the first day. “We wanted to stop at 50,” Tessicini recalls, “but then we thought, we can’t turn these girls away.” Three players joined their high school team in the fall. Future plans call for trips to LPGA tournaments and a career day.
But not every organizer meets with immediate success or reaches moderate goals. Michele Trimarche, a pro at PGA WestinLaQuinta, Calif, started a similar program in February. She had been successful in Orlando, when about 100 girls showed up after a local newspaper printed an article about her program. Trimarche promoted her La Quinta event using newspapers, television and fliers. Only 10 girls attended the first session.
Trimarche met with a parent to discuss ways to improve the numbers. They organized an event to draw attention to the program and raise funds. At the end of April, she had 18 kids. “I want to continue this,” an undaunted Trimarche says. “I like working with kids.”
If they reach 10 or 11 years old, and haven’t found a sport or two to occupy their time, girls can be drawn to golf by a relative or family friend, as is often the case with boys. When it comes to providing such an example, however, few people would consider Iowa to be a junior golf powerhouse. The state ranks 30th in population according to census figures, and its location is not conducive to year-round play. But Iowa is the only state to have its own athletic association for girls, and when it comes to golf its numbers are off the charts. According to a survey by the National Federation of State High School Associations, Iowa rated fourth in participation last year with 4,205 girls. Only Texas, California and Minnesota rank higher. Girls’ golf has been a sanctioned sport in Iowa since 1956 and the spring state tournament draws hundreds of spectators.
“It helps that grandmas and moms played high school golf and passed thai tradition down,” Troy Dannen, associate executive secretary of the Iowa Girls’ High School Athletic Union, says in explaining another key to growing participation rates among girls. “Many of the coaches have been around 25 to 30 years and have built up a tradition. People want to be a part of that tradition.”
Dannen cites a wealth of accessible public courses in many towns as a contributing factor to the state s success. Many Iowa professionals provide clinics and course access at reduced rates. Kevin Beard, a PGA of America pro in the Des Moines suburb of Ankeny, allows kids to play for free after 7:30 p.m. during the week in the summer. “I think that helps keep them interested,” Beard says. “But after the [high school] season ends a lot of the girls go do other things. Boys tend to dive in and just work and work. Girls dive in and when it’s done, they’ll go do something else.”
Beard also conducts a winter program for dedicated players. When girls first joined the program four years ago, only two showed up. This year, 58 of 130 participants were girls. One girl drove 45 minutes to attend the 90-minute sessions.
“We had more than 50 girls out for the golf team [at Ankeny High] this spring,” Beard says. “A few years ago, the team wasn’t very good … now we have a lot of girls who want to be part of a winner.”
Another success story is Michigan; with the addition of 20 teams this year alone, girls’ golf has matched soccer as the fastest-growing sport in the state. I have not seen anything like what’s been happening in the last three or four years, and I’ve been doing this since 1977,” exclaims Suzanne Martin, assistant
director for the Michigan High School Athletic Association.
An annual Michigan Girls Golf Day organized each March by pro Sheila Tansey serves as a precursor to the high school season. Coaches and players unite for a series of clinics and discussions with people from the industry.
At the other end of the scale is South Carolina, a state people might consider golf-rich. Only a handful of schools in Columbia, the capital and largest city, have girls’ teams and one of the state’s best players, Erica Battle, played on the boys team because her school doesn’t have a girls squad. Schools with enroll ments as high as 3,000 students can’t find three or four girls to field a team.
Janet Hoffman, the girls’ coach at Ridge View High, could not convince the school’s top player, Whitney Sylvan, to play. “It’s a mystery to me why more girls aren’t playing,” says Hoffman, who took over as coach in the spring of 2001 and did everything within her power to encourage girls to play. Some only see golf played on TV and think it’s too boring. “If they get that first chance to play, I think some of them would get hooked,” adds Hoffman. “Our tennis coach is from Buffalo, N.Y., and he started a lacrosse team for girls and we have a gazillion girls out for the sport.”
Another state where opportunities for girls on the high school level have been inconsistent is North Carolina. The home of Pinehurst lags well behind seasonal golf states such as Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota and Indiana (see chart below). In fall 2000, for example, just eight of 15 districts fielded teams in heavily populated Wake County, which includes Raleigh. One girls’ coach, citing the funding of boys’ programs, refused to continue — unless he received some sort of stipend.
Among the states struggling to build girls golf is California,which first offered it in 1998. Despite ranking second among states in number of participants, it lags far behind Texas, which has fewer residents, and last fall some schools dropped their teams after one girl filed a gender-equity complaint when she failed to make her school’s team. At the time, girls’ teams required a minimum of three players in a play-four-count-three format. Boys’ teams used a play-six-count-five format. As a result of the suit, the California Office of Civil Eights mandated that the state interscholastic federation increase the minimum for girls’ teams to five players to match the boys.
Some schools didn’t have enough players to field teams. A handful of coaches refused to follow the new guidelines, even though section officials said anyone disobeying the rules would be ineligible for postseason competition.
Several coaches fell the changes were made too quickly for a sport so new to the high school sports landscape. Rocky Parker, coach at St. Margaret’s in San Juan Capistrano, had six girls try out for the team, but only two could break 65 for nine holes. They elected not to compete as a team until the quality of play improved. Parker notes that golf is not like soccer or Softball, where a team can cover for a deficient player.
Donna Lopiano, executive director of the Women’s Sports Foundation, told the Los Angeles Times that the new rules should not deny any girls an opportunity to play. “There should be some way to accommodate the developing programs,” she said When all else fails, the carrot that is supposed to draw young women to the game is the abundance of scholarship money available at universities. In fact, NCAA rules allow more golf scholarships per program for women (six) than men (four). But study the NCAA participation survey and one thing becomes glaringly obvious: Golf is one of the few sports where men (735) easily outdistance women (431) in number of teams.
But women’s programs continue to grow. Richmond, St. John’s and Virginia are adding women’s teams this fall. In the Big Sky Conference, women’s golf is a required core sport for membership; men’s golf is not.
Filling all those scholarships has been a challenge. A few years ago, it was not uncommon to see 20 to 30 percent of available scholarships go unused. But, says LissaHorton, the junior golf director for the Tennessee Golf Foundation and the women’s coach at Belmont University, the word is getting out.
“Lots of girls had delusions of grandeur about playing at Tennessee or Duke and didn t look any farther,” says Horton. “More and more [girls] are taking the time to find out what’s out there.”
Brzostowski of the Carolinas Golf Association, a former player at North Carolina-Wilmington, has an explanation for why scholarships might be rejected by recipients: “Nobody wants to go out and shoot 100 against schools that have players who shoot 75 or 80.”
So women’s coaches often recruit foreign talent. Duke, one of the nation’s best teams, has one U S. player and five foreigners. This season’s top collegian is Mexico’s Lorena Ochoa, who won seven of eight tournaments. Seven of the last 12 NCAA Division I women’s champions were international players, and since 1998, 18 of 39 National Golf Coaches Association first-team All-America spots have gone to foreign-born players.
“I know that the men’s coach here would rather recruit all international players,” says Horton. “They come in with a better work ethic. They really want to be here. They don’t have any social problems. There are a good percentage of [U.S.] girls who do have strong work ethics. But a lot get burned out after being at the AJGA level for several years. They have been hounded ever since they were [13] and they get tired by the time they get to college.”
Getting girls to continue competing after the high school season may be the biggest challenge. Tansey, the Michigan Girls Golf Day organizer, says 80 percent of the girls in the state who shoot 90s or better don’t play in the summer. Eliminate the team aspect and the thrill is gone? Tansey attributes much of it to self-motivation. “A lot of [girls'] high school coaches teach the social aspect of the game rather than the competitive side of it,” Tansey says. “You coach girls differently than boys. You have to set up practices that encourage competitiveness and aggressiveness rather than just making friends on the course.”
Therein lies the difficulty faced by organizers of junior programs who are searching for the secrets to increasing participation rates. If a program is too competitive when they are in their early years, girls may drift to other sports; a few years later, when they’re teens, they may have the same reaction if a program isnot competitive enough.
Which brings us back to 11-year-old Ashley Kent, who lives next to a golf course but doesn’t foresee a day when she would play regularly. Unless, of course, a bunch of her friends were suddenly to take up the game.
“It would be more competitive,” she says. “I’d be able to go out and play with my friends.”
