AURORA, Ont. – Ninety of the top 100 golfers on the LPGA Tour are set to tee it up later this summer at the CP Women’s Open, but in the eyes of organizers, sponsors, and fans, there’s really just one.
Brooke Henderson is the defending champion at Canada’s lone LPGA Tour stop, but she’s a lot more than that.
She’s an icon in the sport, not just in Canada, but globally. The LPGA Tour just put out a new brand campaign, and Henderson is the face.
She’s a bubbly star with an unlimited ceiling. Henderson captured last year’s CP Women’s Open by four shots to become the first Canadian to win her national open in 45 years.
And the numbers don’t lie: she’s playing some of the best golf of her career right now.
Henderson is second in Scoring Average on the LPGA Tour, has made the second-most birdies and eagles of anyone, and she’s shot more rounds in the 60’s than any of her competitors.
She won her ninth LPGA Tour title in mid-June, and in the process became the winningest Canadian from either the LPGA or PGA Tour (George Knudson, Mike Weir, and Sandra Post were previously tied at the top, with eight).
Henderson is also becoming more comfortable in front of the spotlight. She did no less than 10 one-on-one interviews for a variety of national media outlets Tuesday, combined with an exclusive Q&A session, and a corporate appearance for one of her many sponsors.
The shy teenager from small-town Ontario has become an authoritative voice for young girls and fellow athletes alike.
She answered an awkward question about recent controversial comments about the LPGA made by Tiger Woods’ one-time swing coach Hank Haney – the likes of which got Haney’s radio show removed from SiriusXM programming – with a worldly answer that showed her maturity.
“We are a very global Tour and we have some very talented players to be in the position they are,” she said. “Some of my best friends are out on this Tour from all over the world. It takes a special person to be that good, and to be nice as well, which I think the LPGA Tour is known for.”
And Henderson herself is the epitome of that combination of being “that good” and “that nice.” If Tuesday at Magna Golf Club showed anything, it’s that 2019 could go down in history as an all-time year for Canadian golf.
She said she’s been inspired recently by the success of the Toronto Raptors (her family watched every game of their run to the championship) and of Corey Conners, who won on the PGA Tour in April.
“I watched him win, and I was like, ‘I think it’s time for me to start doing more of that,’” she said.
The Prime Minister sent her a note after win No. 9, and earlier, after win No. 8, someone even more powerful said hello.
“Wayne Gretzky came over to shake my hand and said I was ‘fun to watch.’ I was like, ‘What, are you serious?’” Henderson said, in a classic 21-year-old way. “Sometimes I wonder why they’re reaching out to me.”
They’re reaching out because she’s doing something no individual Canadian athlete has done, perhaps ever: continuous individual global success.
At times she makes the most difficult game in the world seem easy.
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The CP Women’s Open, she said, was the tournament she wanted to win the most since she was young. There’s a photo of the trophy up in her parents’ home in Smiths Falls – it’s likely been replaced now with a photo of Henderson herself holding that same trophy.
“To have all that come true last year was just incredible,” she said.
In 2017, Henderson played the CP Women’s Open in Ottawa, less than an hour from her hometown, and said the crowds were crazy. She knew so many people outside the ropes, since busloads of patrons came in. She said that craziness prepared her for 2018 when, at times on Sunday at the Wascana Country Club in Regina, fans seemed to be watching no one other than Henderson.
This year the CP Women’s Open is expected to be a big draw since it’s returning to the Greater Toronto Area for the first time since 2001.
Henderson has also proven she’s comfortable at tournaments where she’s had success in the past. She’s won three different events on the LPGA Tour twice, and said there is always a good energy at tournaments she’s won.
She said she’s going to try to recreate those great memories once again.
“I’m sure it will be crazy being a little bit closer (to home),” she explained. “Hopefully I can feed off them and put myself in a position on the weekend to make a charge.”
So Henderson has the good energy going for her this year, she’s already thinking the course will fit her game (“Perfect,” was her quick reply when it was insinuated she could be aggressive off the tee), and she will have the most boisterous of crowds following her every move in a few weeks’ time just north of the country’s biggest city.
As of now, it seems the 2019 CP Women’s Open has all the ingredients to ensure the year of Brooke Henderson continues.
