This is the time of the rising Thai
By Lewine Mair • January 13, 2023
Atthaya Thitikul (left) and Ariya Jutanugarn embrace the opportunity to elevate the profile and performance of women golfers from Thailand. Photo: Thananuwat Srirasant, Getty Images
In Korea, the women have always outshone the men. In Thailand, on the other hand, the men led the way while giving us a fair idea of why Thais have what it takes to be great players.
Boonchu Ruangkit, for example, once explained that Tiger Woods, even though he was not a practicing Buddhist, was thrice blessed in having a Thai mother. He said that her ways, with particular reference to her powers of meditation, had seeped from mother to son. "You see it in Tiger's serenity and in the respect he has for his elders," said Ruangkit, a Thai senior golfer who was a five-time winner on the Asian Tour. "He always affords people the courtesy of looking them in the eye."
According to Voralak Suwanvanichkij, an expert on Thai ways, the phrase "mai pen rai," which means "never mind," captures the locals' knack of "keeping cool in taxing or annoying situations."
The Thai female golfers, who are today seen as the next Koreans, have that in abundance. Ariya Jutanugarn is the most successful of their number to date, having won 12 LPGA titles, including the 2016 Women's British Open and the 2018 U.S. Women's Open. In 2021, Patty Tavatanakit appeared seemingly out of nowhere to win what was then the ANA Inspiration, now the Chevron Championship.
Yet it was the arrival of Atthaya Thitikul, the star of the show on the LPGA Tour of '22, which made for the greatest waves.
"In their country, it doesn't matter if you're rich or poor. If you're any good, you'll make it." – Chris McCalmont
Thitikul was a 9-year-old when she joined the Thai national junior squad for a trip to America for the World Junior Golf Championships in Florida. Though it was the child's first trip abroad, her parents left her to it. It seemed highly improbable until Chris McCalmont, a caddie who lives in Thailand, took me aside and gave me chapter and verse as to why that was.
Where in the U.S. there is a more individual approach, with parents shepherding their offspring to a tournament and staying put, Thailand officials not only look after their young golfers as if they were their own – they also pay the bills.
"In their country," said McCalmont, who caddies for Pornanong Phatlum, another Thai, "it doesn't matter if you're rich or poor. If you're any good, you'll make it."
Patty Tavatanakit of Thailand comes out of nowhere to makes a splash at the 2021 ANA Inspiration. Photo: Kyodo News via Getty Images
Thai players are no different from their officials. Ariya Jutanugarn, whose early success prompted Thitikul to try and follow in her footsteps, has been endlessly helpful to those who have followed in her wake. "The best thing she has told me," said the then 15-year-old Thitikul when we met at the 2018 HSBC Women's Champions in Singapore, "is that mistakes can be the key to success." As for Jutanugarn's older sister Moriya, she is an endless source of advice when it comes to course management."
The first thing I noticed about Thitikul, who had won the LET's Thailand Championship as a 14-year-old amateur the previous year, was that she hadn't dressed up to the nines to tee up among the professionals. Refreshingly, she came across as every inch the unspoiled schoolgirl she intended to remain for the next two years before turning professional.
Another thing you had to like was her on-course demeanor. She was not seeking any limelight while, on those rare occasions when she made a mistake, she was never about to blame anyone other than herself. When, for instance, she did not quite hit her second out of the middle at the par-5 eighth on the first day, there was no dark look for her caddie who went under the name of Yod. Instead, she said, "I'm so sorry!" Yod laughed and she was soon following suit.
Two-under on the first day and 1-under on the second, her 4-under effort on Saturday was nothing short of spectacular. She was 2-under going out and, as had happened on the Friday, she went up a gear at the end to turn a 70 into a 68. It left her lying in a share of 12th place with such as Lydia Ko. She finished the event in a share of eighth place.
For one more fascinating piece of history from the Thai women's game, you have to go back to 2008 when Moriya Jutanugarn made a name for herself in the U.K. by winning the R&A's Junior Open at Hesketh, the course next door to Royal Birkdale, the home of that year's Open Championship.
The Junior Open finished on the Wednesday of Open week, and at a time when the massed ranks of the TV and writing fraternity were putting the final touches to their Open previews. Even the R&A had none of its people stationed at Hesketh to record the details of how the R&A's leading under-16 event had been won by a girl for the first time – and a 13-year-old one, at that.
Jutanugarn, would you believe, had come from five shots back to win by a shot from Jordan Spieth and have her name etched directly below Patrick Reed's on the trophy.
So modest a soul is Moriya Jutanugarn that she never mentions it.
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