Jordan Spieth isn’t the only one chasing the Grand Slam this summer.
Major championship history hangs in the balance as world number one Inbee Park has the opportunity to complete the Career Grand Slam with victories at the Ricoh Women’s British Open and Evian Championship. She is a two-time winner of the U.S. Women’s Open, three-time winner of the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship and 2013 champion of the ANA Inspiration. Park would become just the seventh player in the history of the LPGA Tour to accomplish the feat.
Already a three-time winner this season, the South Korean has played well in the other two majors she has yet to win. Park finished fourth last year at the Ricoh Women’s British Open at Royal Birkdale Golf Club and T-10 at last season’s Evian Championship, which became recognized as a major in 2013. Park won the event in 2012.
Rookie Sei Young Kim was runner-up to Park in her victory at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship and finished T-4 at the ANA Inspiration. She made the cut in both her major starts in 2014 and with two wins already this season, as well as four top-6 finishes, Kim is able to make history of her own this summer. With a victory, Kim would become the first rookie to win a major championship since Anna Nordqvist in 2009.
Now six years after that first win on Tour, Nordqvist is still one to watch heading into the season’s final three majors. In May, the Swede won the ShopRite LPGA Classic for her fifth LPGA victory and has contended at this year’s majors, T-4 at the ANA Inspiration and T-9 at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship. She finished in the top-12 in three of her last four appearances in the Ricoh Women’s British Open and closed out the 2014 majors with a top-10 finish at the Evian Championship. Nordqvist has yet to win another major since capturing the 2009 ANA Inspiration as a rookie.
Morgan Pressel made history of her own in capturing the 2007 then titled Kraft Nabisco Championship, becoming the youngest to win a major championship on the LPGA Tour at 18-years of age. Now eight years later, Pressel is still in the hunt for that second major championship. But given the swing changes she has implemented over the last year, resulting in four, top-5 finishes, she is in a better position to win than at any other time in her career. Since 2007, Pressel has missed just one cut in the U.S. Women’s Open and posted five, top-20 finishes, including runner-up in 2011. She has played well in the Ricoh Women’s British Open as well, finishing in the top-21 three of the last five years.
The Ricoh Women’s British Open is one that Cristie Kerr would also like to add to her list of accomplishments, where she finished in the top-16 from 2008 to 2013 before withdrawing from last year’s event due to illness. The winner of the 2007 U.S. Women’s Open, Kerr followed her victory with three more top-10’s before missing the cut last year. She currently holds two legs of the Career Grand Slam with her win in 2007 as well as her 2010 victory at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship. A win at either of the season’s final two majors would bring the Tour veteran closer to making history.
)
)
)
)
