36 Holes to Significance

By Jared Trexler

I should be at Newport Country Club tomorrow. As a single-digit handicap who takes the game seriously and understands its long and storied history, tomorrow is a monumental day.

For starters, the Mid-Atlantic coast is a photographer's dream. Scenic views of crashing waves, sailing boats and rolling shoreline terrain scream of a vintage Norman Rockwell masterpiece.

Put away the paintbrush and pick up a seven iron, and Newport Country Club is a golfer's paradise. The shot value is unsurpassed and the course breathes the game in its purest form -- a true test on land completely at the mercy of mother nature.

When the sun shines and the wind stays away, Newport can lay down like a lamb. However, when the sea breeze turns inland and the clouds soon follow, the lamb is eaten by a roaring lion.

Place the seven iron back in the bag and lay down the blueprints, and the William Davis design is an architectural pleasure. The site lines are eye-pleasing and fair, each knob and hollow has a purpose and the course flows. It looks like a bulldozer never touched the piece of property, even if significant amounts of dirt were actually moved.

Put the aesthetic marvel of Newport Country Club aside and one can truly understand why a sports fan, especially one who writes for a living, should make the trip to witness history as part of a Fourth of July weekend.

There will be fireworks. Michelle Wie will be the cause of the constant "ooohs" and "aaahs."

As fate always has it, champions are somehow inevitably linked. Tiger Woods took home his second of three straight United States Amateur titles at Newport in 1995. His hat donned an "S" instead of a swoosh, but the now trademark fist pump was on full display.

Tomorrow afternoon, a new era in golf could be ushered in with the high tide and ocean gusts.

And I don't just mean women's golf.

When a 16-year-old prodigy has come within inches of making a cut on thePGA Tour, captivated the golf world through 18 holes of a 36-hole United States Open sectional qualifier and handled a mentally-taxing sport under a national microscope, the significance spans much further than the rich-and-famous community on the banks of Rhode Island.

Michelle Wie isn't a girl on the golf course, despite physical evidence to the contrary. She hits it further than anyone else her equal, has all the shots and seems to embrace the spotlight.

It would be only fitting if her first victory came at the LPGA's most demanding test. And on this golf course, where the analogy of the floodgates opening to a tidal wave of triumph fits accurately with the event's setting.

There is so much golf still to play. Major champions Pat Hurst and Se Ri Pak are in the hunt. So is the stylish-dressed Paula Creamer and one of the game's greatest champions, Annika Sorenstam.

The sun will rise in Newport at 5:16 a.m. (et) tomorrow morning. The first ball of a Sunday marathon will be struck somewhere around 7:00 a.m.

Around 12 hours later, a champion will most likely be crowned behind a breathtaking backdrop full of historical significance.

Wie's championship chronology could begin with a Sunday stroll down the shoreline. And like Woods 11 years earlier, she will have to play 36 scheduled holes to prove her mettle.

As a sports fan, I wish I could be there to take it all in.


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Copyright 2006 The Phanatic