NO GUTS, NO GLORY
Suzann Pettersen (b. 1981) ended her career as
Foto: John Raoux / AP / NTB
a professional golf player in 2019. At her best she was ranked as #2 in the World. She is a lifetime ambassador for NIKE and a competitors ambassador for the humanitarian organisation Right To Play.
‘Suzann Pettersen, a great competitor, loyal and a lot of fun to be around – unless you are going down the stretch with her.’ Laura Davis
‘I have known Suzann for over 20 years. She has always been a fierce competitor and a lot of fun. Some of my best Solheim memories are with her, including our comeback at Barsebäck.’ Annika Sørenstam
‘In my 35 years working with Tour Pros, both men and women, Suzann is at the top of my list in talent, dedication, passion and work ethic. She is one of the best professionals I have ever been lucky enough to work with.’ Butch Harmon
‘When I played with Tutta I always loved how she carried herself on the golf course. Strong body language with calmness and spirit of the game … Playing on tour with her is one of my greatest memories.’ Ai Miyazto
‘Suzann is someone I would always want on my side, picking her for Solheim 2019 was a no brainer. I couldn`t think of anyone I`d rather have fighting for you down the last few holes.’ Catriona Mathew
SUZANN “TUTTA” PETTERSEN has been leading the field in one of the World´s largest individual sports for 20 years. In Solheim Cup in 2019 she made the deciding put for Europe against USA and with that ended her career with a great comeback. She had just become a mother, and it had been over 20 months since she last prepared for and played a great tournament. Still, she was again the best when it mattered the most. Best under maximum pressure. In the course of her Golfing career, Suzann Pettersen achieved 15 individual victories in the LPGA-tour, and two Major titles. She was ranked in the top ten (mostly in the top 5) of the World ranking of Golf for 436 weeks, and has represented Europe nine times in Solheim Cup. In 2020 she received The Honorary Award at the Norwegian Athletics Gala, and she is a lifetime ambassador for NIKE. In 2012 she played her very best Golf and was at the hight of her career. She was ranked second in the World ranking and was just about to take the final step up to the top. Instead, she was once again injured, an injury that could have stopped her from playing professional Golf. And still she managed to do a comeback. What is it that makes her so mentally strong that she could return to the top again and again, and preform on a high level in Golf for 20 years? In this book the extreme winner tells the stories about the games on an international top level and life off the Golf course.
Foto: Peter Morrison /AP / NTB
Foto: Denis Balibouse/ Reuters / NTB
SAMPLE TRANSLATION by Lucy Moffatt
SUZANN PETTERSEN
TUTTA NO GUTS, NO GLORY
(p.9–13)
The Last Putt Solheim Cup Gleneagles, Scotland Sunday 15th September 2019 I’m nervous as hell before the approach shot on the 18th hole. My ball is nicely positioned on the fairway. It’s 84 metres to the flag, which is a comfortable distance. I couldn’t have asked for better. It’s spot on! My tasks are also crystal clear: just do your thing with the wedge. Shoulder-shoulder, not a full swing. But the pin is awkwardly placed, up in the centre of a rise on the green. I could play a high-risk shot, be aggressive and aim for the pin. But that won’t leave me any room for error. If I miss two metres to the right, I’ll spin off the fairway. To the left of the flag the margins are even narrower. It’s tight and with so much at stake, I don’t feel inclined to play the hero – and maybe end up looking like an idiot. To give myself the best possible chance, I mark out an area behind the pin as the point I’m aiming at instead. In the fat part of the green, where I have a little bit more leeway to the side. I swing. The ball comes off my club perfectly. I’ve played this shot thousands of times so I know it. The ball strike, the timing, everything’s right. The ball flies and I know it’s inside lengthwise. I’ve put a bit of spin on it so it’ll roll back towards the hole. But I can’t see how much it’s spinning because the green is higher up in the
terrain. All I can see from where I’m standing is the top of the flag. But I hear the cheers of the players on my team who have already finished their matches and are sitting together on the tribune behind the green. The spectators stand up and applaud. Is it that close? I walk up onto the green and am almost a bit disappointed because I’d hoped it was nearer than it is. I’ve still got a good chance of a birdie and I’m exactly where I most want to be. At historic Gleneagles in the Scottish highlands, playing a crucial singles match against Marina Alex of the USA, in the last round of this year’s Solheim Cup – a three-day tournament between teams from Europe and the USA, which takes place every other year. Many of my best moments haven’t come from my solo career, but here in the Solheim Cup. Whenever I play in this tournament, my heart is always in my mouth from the very start. Overcoming my own nervousness and tension, and delivering a good result here is a really tremendous feeling. There are twelve players on each team. The best from each continent, on the biggest stage for international women’s golf. It’s the most important tournament to win, but also most decidedly the one it hurts most bitterly to lose. I know that from personal experience because I’m taking part for the ninth time since my debut at Interlachen Country Club in Minnesota in 2002. But it’s the first time I’m taking part as a mum. There hasn’t been much competition golf in the past couple of years, but I’ve worked my fingers to the bone to come back, and this time I owe my place on the team to the captain, Catriona ‘Beanie’ Matthew. Captain’s pick. Because she trusts me in the heat of battle. But
I’m also a controversial pick. The question swirled around: ‘Has she still got it?’ Twelve singles matches have been started off at ten-minute intervals since this morning. My match was the tenth to start but now the eleventh and twelfth matches have both been decided before the 18th hole. This can happen in match play where you’re playing for every single hole, scoring one point per hole won and half a point for a tie. As the captain, Catriona has therefore had twelve matches to keep track of on this particular day, and she’s always tried to be on the spot where things are at tipping point, when the pressure is greatest. So I didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to realise how serious the situation was when she turned up at my match for the first time that day just before the teeing ground on the 18th hole. Her voice was calm but her message came through loud and clear. ‘You just need to win this match, Suzann. That’s why I picked you for the team.’ I get the picture and I’m ready – because over my career I’ve learned to love these situations, where everything is at stake. When the pressure is highest on the course, I often have complete inner peace. It’s a feeling of being able to kill with a glance from a quiet mind – of knowing that I can deliver. Scotland is the homeland of golf. Ninety thousand people are following this year’s Solheim Cup out on the course. There’s a massive mountain of people around the green when Marina Alex and
I come up to putt. But it’s silent. Totally, totally silent. You could drop anything, no matter how little or light, and you’d hear it fall. All eyes are upon us because within the next few minutes, only one winner will be left standing: the USA or Europe. Marina Alex has also played a superb approach shot. But she didn’t put as much spin on it and is lying a bit further away from the pin than me. On the other side of the hole, with a trickier putt. Hers is sloping downwards, whereas I’ll be putting uphill. I’d choose my putt over hers any day and she knows it. I have an advantage. But if she holes out, it’s game over and the USA will win. She putts first and it’s never going in: it isn’t on the line, it isn’t tracking. I see it at once – she’s missed to the right. She’s a picture of disappointment from top to toe. I stand there calmly for an extra second or two. Then take a deep breath, exchanging glances with my caddie, Mike. The Solheim Cup is in my hands now. Everything has led up to this moment. Because as I prepare to take my putt, Bronte Law decides her match against Ally MacDonald on the 17th hole. She has played like a pit-bull, doing some crazy catching up and securing a full point for Europe. Now there’s only one match left on the course and one shot left in the entire tournament. Our match and my putt. If I sink it, we’ll win. If I miss, we’ll tie and, as reigning champion, the USA will take the trophy home. I read the putt but can’t see a thing. Nada! Am I blind? I can often see a putt track. I see the line it will follow to the hole, I see everything. But now I’m drawing a total blank. I call in Mike and ask him if he can see anything. He thinks it’s a straight line; the
point to aim for is in the centre of the hole. I agree on the line but am more and more inclined to aim for another point, a few millimetres left of centre. It isn’t a massive difference of opinion but I know it can mean the difference between heaven and hell. Here I stand, facing the decisive putt in the Solheim Cup, and I’m racked by doubt! These are the moments I’ve always loved, the moments I’ve trained and lived for. But now my head starts to spin and my thoughts drift to Saturday’s couples match. That time I was playing with Anne van Dam of the Netherlands against Brittany Altomare and Annie Park of the USA. Although the conditions were hellish, the golf I played made this one of my best performances in the past ten years. But we were tied all the way and took it in turns to win holes. The match kept going all the way to the green on the 18th hole. Exactly where I’m standing now. That time, too, I ended up taking the last putt of the day. If I sank it, we would win the hole and share the match with the USA. Half a point each. I had a chance to decide but played the worst putt from here to eternity. There was no doubt about it: it could never go in – it was nowhere near! The loss was painful and, for me personally, a total crisis. After all, this was just the kind of situation where I always used to sink the ball! It was a golden opportunity of the kind that rarely comes your way. It was my moment – and I failed to seize the opportunity. I was so disappointed in myself! At the team dinner in the clubhouse people laughed and had fun. But I was just annoyed about that putt. There was no end to my irritation. I’d been play-
ing so well and yet I’d failed when it came to a truly important shot. I didn’t deliver! Was it possible that I’d fallen to a level where I didn’t have it any more? Had I lost it? Back in my hotel room, I lay alone brooding over these thoughts. I had plenty of time to think so I nursed my disappointment long into the night. Now it’s Sunday and here I am again: on the 18th hole, which will not be my nemesis. Lucky me! I have a fresh opportunity to decide things. A chance I never thought I’d have again. I shall embrace it. Payback for Saturday! I won’t let two such chances pass me by. Of all the players on our team, I’d choose myself to sink this putt, every time. Pressure? Bring it on! My head’s straightened out again. I feel strong and sharp, and the final decision is taken. I’m aiming a little left of centre. Centre-left. I’ve had my putting coach, David Orr, with me in Scotland the whole week. For security and back-up, to get a good feeling on the greens. So I have plenty of fresh triggers in the bank. It feels natural to settle for the words straight back, because I’ve had a tendency all that week to drop my putter slightly into the track when I’m starting my swing. I’ve finished reading the putt. I position myself. My sole focus now is on swinging my putter straight backwards. Straight back, straight back. I’m totally in my own world now. Nothing can get through. Apart from the briefest of instants when I hear a TV commentator just by the side of the green: ‘Suzann Pettersen in her ninth appearance in the Solheim Cup. This is
it!’ Then I don’t hear anything else, because I’m squeezing the trigger and setting in motion the most important putt of my life.
(p.17-21)
Stabilisers? No thanks! ‘Tutta, you need to use stabilisers!’ It was autumn 1984 and Mum was calling out to her threeand-a-half-year-old daughter in utter despair. But her words fell on deaf ears, and besides it was too late: I was already lying bruised on the tarmac at the bottom of the steep hill that led from our house down towards Holmendammen. Both my big brothers had just cycled down there on their bicycles, so of course I’d be able to do it too! There was nothing for it but to dry my tears, plaster my cuts and get back on my bike to have another go. That’s how it always was. My brothers challenged me in everything. Gunerius was two years and Stefan seven years older than me. If they climbed trees, I’d climb trees too – and generally climb even higher. On the football pitch, on the ski slopes, on the bandy ice, on the cross-country ski tracks. I hung out with them all the time and wanted to match them in everything – and preferably, to be best. I had lots of girlfriends but my brothers were my big role models. I never played with dolls and never wore dresses. It’s true that there’s a picture I drew of myself in a dress with our dog, Pontus, but I never dreamed of being a little princess. Mum bought me cute dresses but I preferred to nick clothes from my broth-
ers’ wardrobe. My clothes style made me look like a hobbit. Mum used to tear her hair out. But I didn’t care: my brothers were the ones who set the standard in everything. I grew up in competition mode – as if I was battling to the head of the herd every single day. I wanted to win. The competition mentality is very deeply embedded in me and I think it always has been. Meeting loss and victory with equanimity has never worked in my world. But no matter how painful it was, as a golfer I had to learn to lose in the end. It’s true that it didn’t happen until I’d been playing for a while because as long as I played at home in Norway, I dominated all age classes. I even beat players who were far older than me. But no matter how good you are as a kid, you’ll eventually meet resistance at new levels, which means that you’ll lose more often than you win. For me, the first defeats on the golf course came in Sweden. But that just made me more motivated. I grew more determined and I got better. Because although winning has always been my goal, there’s something else that has been even more important: the processes! The most important thing for me has always been to develop, to break through my limits, to achieve at ever higher levels and to feel a sense of continuous improvement and progress. And there’s never been any question of choosing the path of least resistance. This will to develop – not to mention the power to carry it through – has been the core of my motivation. Without my joy in the processes themselves, I would never have put in so much ar-
duous effort or spent so much time and energy on golf as I have. The moment of victory is sweet but short-lived. The processes never end. When you’re the baby of the family you have no choice but to listen and learn. So I wasn’t especially chatty as a kid. But I was independent, observant and alert. I could sit alone for hours under the stairs at home just listening to all the conversations in the house. I loved it, and at all times I knew where everybody in the family was and what they were up to. I’ve always liked having oversight and control. It’s a character trait that’s served me well in my golfing career on the whole, although it has also made it especially challenging for me to cope with situations I don’t have control over. Until I was three years old, I spoke only if somebody asked me a question, but I was already walking at seven months and started kindergarten early because my motor functions were so strong. I sought out physical challenges, and Mum and Dad remember that it was difficult to hold me back. I was almost always outside playing, usually with the boys. Often unafraid and over-keen. During the annual skiing race in our neighbourhood, I was generally halfway around the course before anybody could grab me and slap a starting number on me. And once I passed the finishing line, I had to be stopped from heading straight for the trophy table to pick up the biggest cup, which I assumed was mine. A winner’s instinct or childish arrogance? Go figure. But as a child I felt that I was very good at all games and sport, almost irrespective of what they were. Even when I was pitifully bad.
There’s been something there all along. Could it be because I had such strong encouragement to achieve at home? ‘You can do this, Tutta!’ It gave me the courage and self-confidence to meet challenges and really go for it. I was never pushed, but I grew to enjoy competing. What’s more, I was stubborn as a mule, just like Dad, and never gave in straight away – even that was obviously the smartest decision. It took time, a long time, to understand that rhythmic gymnastics weren’t my forte. I was six or seven years old, stiff as a board and when I tried to do the splits, you could have fit a beachball under my backside. It was embarrassing to be trailing behind the others but it took a blunt, honest reality check from the coach to make me give up on that project. She asked me straight out whether it wouldn’t be better to spend my time on something else. It was perfectly okay to get that message because I didn’t like the gymnastics exercises as much as the other activities I was involved with either. I liked riding, but that came to an abrupt halt too because we couldn’t afford a show jumper. But I was brought up to be an all-rounder and before I specialised in golf at the age of eleven, my schedule was packed with other sports. My upbringing near Holmendammen, an open green lung at the foot of Holmenkoll Hill – offered countless opportunities for outdoor play and sport, so the there was no shortage of year-round exercise and physical activity throughout my childhood. I crushed most of the boys at bandy until long into my childhood. In downhill skiing, I competed for Ready. I won races and have since
wondered whether I gave up too soon. Should I have tried out at junior level? How good could I have got at skiing? Maybe it sounds odd but over the years, I’ve often daydreamed about and pictured switching sporting arenas. Not as a reserve and one of the crowd but as a dominant player – the way I have always aimed to be in golf. I must be one of the world’s biggest tennis fans, and really like Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal. I like to think I could have become good at tennis too and in my head I can even be good. But then, when friends ask if I’d like to play, I quickly make my excuses. Because the fact is, I suck. A few years back, I was invited to a match against the American ambassador to Norway, Barry B. White. To be sure I’d impress, I prepared for the match by taking intensive private classes with Kirsten Robsahm, who’s won National Championship gold by the tonne herself. But when I lost in two straight sets without winning a single game I was brought down to earth with a bump, suffering a spot of wounded pride and losing a tiny bit of face. Of course, it shouldn’t have mattered, but in the moment it felt pretty bad. Maybe I have a bit of trouble taking things lightly when it comes to skills I want to master. But it’s good to dream – and sometimes totally necessary. Because it makes a change from all the normal, tedious fussing over details and the often-solitary efforts top sportspeople put in during their working days. Those days that account for the vast majority of life. It wasn’t a given that golf would become my sport. In fact, it was pretty random and yet, at the same time, perhaps not all that ran-
dom at all. Dad is a keen amateur golfer, you see, and the die was actually cast when I went with him up to the golf course in Bogstad for the first time aged six. Mum was mostly a home-maker throughout my childhood and we never came back to an empty house. But with three active kids, her days were hectic, so if Dad was going to pursue his hobby with a clear conscience two or three times a week, there was no getting out of it: Mum gave him a clear message that if he wanted to play golf, he’d have to take his daughter along with him. That’s how it started. Dad and me, side by side on the driving range at Bogstad. Me with a sawn-off club in my hands, which I used to imitate him. I swung with all my might and my shots were pretty much straight from the outset. Trond Kracht, an experienced junior trainer at the club, stood and watched me, and couldn’t believe his eyes. ‘This isn’t so difficult, is it?’ I said. I didn’t realise myself but Dad told me later that it was insane to see how quickly I picked up the movements. Listen and learn had now become watch and learn. I kept an eye on what Dad and the other golfers did and didn’t need any further instruction. Give me the club and I’d play perfectly decent shots. It was fun right from the get-go. The good feeling when my waggle and swing worked. The sound of the ball strike. The spark was lit. The whole thing stirred something deep inside me that’s hard to put into words. The nearest I can get to it is love. Golf was in my blood now and after the first shots at Bogstad, I never looked back.
(P. 107-110)
FUCK IT I heard she smashed up her locker in the American locker-room in a rage afterwards. And apparently it was made of mahogany. I understood Michele Redman perfectly because the battle had been going totally her way: she was five points up after the 13th hole in the singles match against me on the last day of the Solheim Cup in September 2002. I’d have to win the last five holes just to tie and share the point with the USA. It was a tough call. But when my chip went straight into the cup from outside the green on the 14th hole I well and truly tasted blood. This was my first Solheim Cup for Europe at Interlachen Country Club in Minnesota and I’d played some pretty decent golf in couples matches with Helen Alfredsson of Sweden the first two days. But now I was firing on all cylinders. Redman isn’t all that easy to play against because she’s a slightly irritating player who just toils away. A bit boring but very dependable. After that chip, though, I was absolutely convinced I could take this match and I started to deliver one spectacular shot after another. Sometimes things just fall into place. And that chip had made me think – time turn my cap around! The expression goes back to my teenage years when I was top of my age class. ‘Turn your cap around, Tutta!’ my family would shout if I was well in the lead after nine holes and getting bored out there on course. ‘Turn your cap around – we don’t want to
see any more dull playing!’ There was nothing for it: I had to turn my cap around, literally. I just thought it was fun; it made me pull myself together, and getting that message usually made me shift into fifth gear. It often pulled my playing up so many notches that after a while, I could send a message back to them: ‘Seen enough good golf yet, or shall I give you even more?’ Now things would start looking very black indeed for Redman at Interlachen, because although it’s true I didn’t turn my cap around, I did make the mother of all comebacks on the last five holes in the Solheim Cup. Redman was visibly shaken after my spectacular chip on the 14th hole. When I effortlessly won the next hole and then downed a strong birdie on the 16th hole, she was totally psyched out. And from that moment on, the normally dependable Redman lost it completely. The 20,000-strong crowd of patriotic Americans was pretty quiet, too, and when I sank the winning putt on the 18th hole to tie the match, the silence was deafening. Mum, on the other hand, performed a rain-dance on the side lines all the way from the 16th hole because she recognised my devil-may care attitude so well that she knew I’d keep it up. As for me, I was so high on adrenalin when the match was over that my answers came out a bit askew when I was interviewed live on American TV on the 18th hole. ‘What did you think when you were five down before the 14th hole and there were only five holes left to play?’ ‘I thought FUCK IT! I’m not going to leave this course without
giving it my absolute all.’
‘Thank you, Suzann Pettersen, and now we’ll go straight to a
commercial break!’ I achieved the astounding feat of saying FUCK IT live on American TV and my words would haunt me for a long time to come. Plenty of people were horrified and there was a lot of gossip about it in golfing circles in Europe and the USA for the next couple of years. When I signed with Nike some years later, they even produced a limited line of golf balls with FUCK IT printed on them to mark the fact that I’d joined their stable. Apparently Jan Ove still has one of these balls lying around at home in his garage so we’ll be able to take it out and reminisce when we reach our rocking-chair days. One of my two major goals in the 2002 season was to qualify for the European team in the Solheim Cup and I was picked as wild card by Captain Dale Read of Scotland after two top-ten placings on the European tour earlier that season. Read is the most laid-back and coolest captain I’ve had in the Solheim Cup. Normally we have a tour bus, but when we drove to the course before the match against Redman in a huge black Cadillac, she sat calmly in the back seat, cigarette in hand, and said: ‘Come on gals, let’s knock ’em dead!’ I was the brat of the team and sat with three others in the front seat. Laura Davies was driving the raft of a car and I was in heaven. It was a bit extra special that year too, because there were no fewer than seven of us Nordics on the European team. Apart from me, there were Annika Sörenstam, Carin Koch, Maria Hjorth, Sophie Gustafson
and Helen Alfredsson from Sweden, and Iben Tinning from Denmark. That made it easy to feel at home as a first-timer. Helen Alfredsson was the one who took me most under her wing when I played two couples matches with her. She became my teacher during the tournament while still letting me be myself. I got to make my own decisions but still leaned on her a lot through the week. It gave me a sense of security to have her by my side even then and Helen has since become a good friend. Feelings were running high between the teams in that year’s Solheim Cup. Even before the tournament started, Catrin Nilsmark of Sweden, who would be our next captain in 2003, added fuel to the fire by sharing her very candid opinions about the American team on Swedish golfing websites. She didn’t hold back, saying – among other things – that America’s superstar Laura Diaz was conceited and Michele Redman was talentless. She described the young player Cristie Kerr as a little brat, adding that the veteran Meg Mallon was past her best. I have no idea what the point of her statements was but if they were intended as some kind of mind game to undermine the American team, her attempt backfired. If anything, the American team became more closely knit. Perhaps that explains why the Americans ended up winning the Solheim Cup that year. Catrin Nilsmark should have been there in Minnesota herself but turned back at the airport in the US when it all flared up. She blamed her decision to return home on back problems. But I think she realised she’d be in even bigger trouble if she showed her face at Interlachen Country Club.
Team Norway’s head coach back then, Peter Svallin of Sweden, was also there to cheer us on in Minnesota. He had this comment for the media: ‘Suzann Pettersen’s participation in the Solheim Cup is the biggest thing that’s ever happened in Norwegian golf.’ So I had every reason to feel proud – and it was also fun knowing that even the name of the tournament, Solheim Cup, has Norwegian roots. Because it’s named after Karsten Solheim, the Norwegian founder of golf club maker Karsten Manufacturing, whose PING products are well known in the golfing world. Solheim was one of the main initiators of efforts to set up an international tournament for women that would be the equivalent of the men’s tournament, the Ryder Cup. He achieved it. The first Solheim Cup took place in 1990 and, up until 2002, it was played in even years. In the wake of 9/11, though, the Ryder Cup was moved to 2002, so after that the Solheim Cup was switched to odd years to avoid a clash with the men’s tournament. As a result, the Solheim Cup was held in both 2002 and 2003. For many years, one of my goals had been to debut in the Solheim Cup at Bärseback, Sweden, in 2004. But this tournament was brought forward to 2003, so by the time 2004 came, I’d actually already played in two Solheim Cups. The 2003 Solheim Cup at Bärseback would end up being perhaps the most intense experience I had on a golf course at any time in my career. But I didn’t know that when I travelled home from Minnesota with a smile on my face and full focus on the season’s last – and perhaps most crucial – goal: qualifying for the professional tour in the USA Ladies Professional Golf Association, LPGA. The biggest stage of all.
(p. 341-349)
Hole to Europe – hell for me ‘This match will go down in Solheim Cup history, Charley!’
I was radiant with happiness after Charley Hull and I had
managed to pull off an almost miraculous catch-up-and-turnaround operation in our foursome against the USA’s Paula Creamer and Morgan Pressel on the morning of the tournament’s second day – having been four holes down against the Americans after the 11th hole. That’s a tough starting point to win a match from considering there were only seven holes left to play. But everything turned around after Charley was a hair’s breadth away from a hole-in-one on the 15th three-par hole. After winning the 15th, 16th and 17th holes, we were tied with the USA before the 18th and final hole. When Charley played a fantastic second stroke on the green, the job was pretty much done: she’d given me the best-ever opportunity for a birdie and all that was left for me to do was hole it – to massive applause from the spectators and those of our teammates who were able to follow the match. But that was where the day’s fun ended because just hours later, Charley and I were paired again for the day’s second foursome, against the USA’s Alison Lee and Brittany Lincicome. We were wellmatched and it was a tight game: we were tied all the way to the 17th hole. And that’s where Alison Lee picked her ball up off the green. Because she thought she shouldn’t have to play that putt. It would never have occurred to me to pick that ball up myself
without checking that the opposing team had conceded the putt; that it really was a gimme – which only applies in match play and is where your opponents allow you not to play the putt, which is nonetheless treated as if it had gone into the hole. This rather unusual rule came about because it can save a bit of time if players aren’t forced to play putts that are perfectly obviously going to go into the hole. But conceding a gimme is also about the opponent avoiding the possibility of losing face by messing up a ludicrously simple putt. I’ve never stood as utterly still on a green in the Solheim Cup as I did on that 17th hole on Saturday 19th September 2015 in Germany, when the first putt of the USA’s Alison Lee brushed past the hole and settled roughly half a club-length behind the cup. And it didn’t even occur to me to say ‘pick it up’ or ‘it’s good’, which is what I say if I want to concede a gimme. Because I didn’t want to give her and the USA the next shot, that short putt, for free. I wanted to see her strike that ball, under the massively tough pressure that was weighing on all four of us players from Europe and the USA at that point in the fourball match, which was on the brink of a tie with just this hole and the 18th left to play. The point is, it’s one thing to play a short putt at training on a Monday morning: in those circumstances, you’ll easily hole 99 out of a hundred. But it’s quite another matter to sink the shot when there’s so much at stake. Solheim Cup 2015 was the biggest golfing event in the history of Germany so I assumed that Alison Lee, the rookie on the USA’s team, was feeling this pressure keenly, surrounded as we were by the sea of people around the green. Many major tournaments are lost because a player misses a short putt under pressure. But instead of putting her ball, she picked it up –
without checking that we agreed. ‘I thought I heard that I could pick it up,’ Lee herself said. But neither my Scottish partner Charley Hull, me nor either of our caddies had said it was a gimme. What’s more, Alison Lee had received several warnings for breaking this very same rule in her two previous matches in Germany. From the moment Lee picks up her ball, things move fast. One of the first things to happen is that the LPGA Rules Official – the referee at the hole – American Dan Maselli asks me, Charley and the caddies whether the putt was conceded. Based on his discussion with us and what he himself saw on the green, he decides there is no indication that the putt was conceded. Alison Lee’s partner Brittany Lincicome also tells him that she didn’t hear anything about it being conceded. There is a rule that allows the player to put the ball back if something has confused her, but Maselli said later that day in a TV interview that nothing in his examination of the facts suggested that he should apply that rule. He has to make a decision and after that, it’s a matter of seconds before he concludes that there has been a breach of regulations and awards ‘Hole to Europe’. In despair, Lee starts to cry. But we have been true to the rules, which even amateurs are familiar with, and are one hole up with just the 18th hole left to play. So far so good. According to the rule book, mind you. But there’s something else that is far more important than that, which, unfortunately, I don’t consider in the heat of battle at the St. Leon-Rot golf club: good sportsmanship. On that day, a competitive side of me that has always been part of my brand and DNA makes me lose contact with my own very
deepest bedrock and that of the sport itself. It’s true that I’ve always played to win, but never at any price. Not if it collides with my own – and golf’s – values of good sportsmanship and fair play. That has always trumped everything. I’ve never been over-zealous and I’ve never wanted to win on the back of other people’s mistakes. That’s was where I went wrong on the 17th green in Germany. It’s a mistake I spotted too late. Sorry! Sometimes people ask me if I would behave in the same way again both in and after the situation that arose on the 17th green. It took me a while to process it, but my answer is both YES and NO. YES because I would still want to see her play the putt, because at that point and with the scores as they stood in the match, it simply wasn’t a gimme in my world. This is world-class sport and I won’t put it any more tamely than that. NO because I wouldn’t want to punish her for breaking the rule once it had happened; instead I’d use the possibilities in the regulations, but which I was unaware of at that time, to even out the scores to a tie again. Because there were several of us, including the captain’s team on the European side, who learned a few things about the rules of match play in the minutes and hours that followed. And the rules offered several possible ways to reverse what had happened both before and after we teed off on the 18th hole. But I can honestly admit that I’d hardly have scrutinised those paragraphs there and then. Because although I can sense that there’s trouble brewing, I’m still absolutely certain that I did the right thing and that we’re totally in the
clear when we leave the green on the 17th hole. And I don’t change my mind even when I meet the gaze of the USA’s captain Juli Inkster on the walkway to the 18th hole and she asks me what the fuck we’re up to. All I’m interested in is winning the match for Europe and helping achieve a full point in Sunday’s round of singles matches. After all, the match is now tipped in our favour. But the atmosphere is heading in a pretty different direction. The trouble starts the minute we leave the green on the 17th hole. First there’s Juli Inkster’s death stare. Then my own European captains who are radiating despair and don’t know what to do. As far as I’m concerned, it seems only logical to tell Charley Hull on the 18th tee that we must just make sure we win the last hole to remove all doubt about who’s best and that will be that. Long live naivety. Even the play on the 18th hole is a chaos. Because when it’s my turn to tee off onto the green – the last player to do so – Annika Sörenstam suddenly comes running up to me on the course, asking ‘What the fuck are we going to do now, Tutta?’ She’s trying to sort things out and find a solution to prevent the hurricane she can see on the horizon. I still haven’t realised what’s building up. But Annika has, and she’s intervening and taking responsibility – even though she really hates controversy. The rest of our captain’s team are seemingly paralysed. But Annika’s good sense doesn’t get through to me. ‘What are we going to do now? Well, I’m going to play onto the green and go for a birdie here, so could you just please let me concentrate.’ If I’d struck into the woods on purpose, giving the Americans the last hole, maybe the world would have looked different in the hours, days,
weeks and months that followed. But I play a great shot. Charley is also playing a strong game, so we win the 18th hole. And with that, we also win our match clearly, two holes up. And in my naivety I still think nobody can fault us now because we’ve proved we’re the best. We would have won anyway. But if I thought that would calm tempers, I couldn’t have been more wrong. Already in the golf cart back from the course, Annika gives me an indication of what’s happening. “This could turn nasty and you may feel the brunt of it, Tutta.’ She’s seen much more of the picture than me: I’m still caught up with the fact that we weren’t the ones who broke the rules. At the press conference after the match, I stand my ground just as stubbornly: ‘I’d do the same again!’ I’ll end up eating those words. Just hours later, before flying back to the USA on Monday morning, I totally abase myself and send out my official apology, which includes the following text: I’ve never felt more gutted and truly sad than about what went down Sunday on the 17th at the Solheim Cup. I am so sorry for not thinking about the bigger picture in the heat of the battle and competition. I was trying my hardest for my team and put the single match and the point that could be earned ahead of sportsmanship and the game of golf itself! I feel like I let my team down and I am sorry. To the U.S. team, you guys have a great leader in Juli Inkster, who I’ve always looked up to and respect so much. Knowing I need to make things “right,” I had a face-to-face chat with her before leaving Germany this morning.
I hope in time the U.S. team will forgive me and know that I have learned a valuable lesson about what is truly important in this great game of golf which has given me so much joy in my life. Being an ambassador for this great game means a lot to me. I wish I could change Sunday for many reasons. Unfortunately I can’t. This week I want to push forward toward another opportunity to earn the Solheim Cup back for Europe in the right way. And I want to work hard to earn back your belief in me as someone who plays hard, but fair. It would be hard to offer a more heartfelt apology but that still wasn’t enough for some people. If anybody is wondering whether I truly was gutted and sad, I can assure them I was. Emotions built up slowly and steadily over the afternoon and evening of the Saturday, exploding when I came into my hotel room that night and met Christian, who warned me: ‘Don’t look at your phone, Tutta.’ What? He might as well have told me not to breathe, because now I just have to look at it. It’s like having a bucket of crap hurled in my face because at first glance, it looks as if I’ve been thrown under the bus on all channels. Alone. For roughly 24 hours, I’m among the world’s most tweeted people and not everything that’s said about me would bear repetition to children or the tender-hearted. A lot of it was very ugly. The harshest blow of all was that some people out there were calling me a cheat. That particular jibe really hit me hard and pained me to the depths of my soul. If that sticks, I can’t bear to play anymore! I had no problem with people questioning my judgement on
the 17th green – because in the name of soul-searching and as the hours went by, I’d already started to question it myself too. But a cheat. That was the very bottom of the barrel. Luckily, though, I knew in the same depths of my soul where these accusations struck me hardest that I wasn’t a cheat. Without that certainty, which essentially comes from Mum and Dad and my upbringing, I think I could have been destroyed in the time that followed because the media storm turned out to be pretty violent. Gimmegate – a name styled after the Watergate scandal that toppled US President Richard Nixon in 1972 – was the term some creative soul in the media struck upon as an appropriate way to refer to the episode in the Solheim Cup. A fun label, sure, but perhaps a bit over the top? It doesn’t exactly help people bear in mind that we’re talking about sport here, not politics or war. When you’re involved in world-class sport, you have to learn to live with tough media treatment but how much punishment should you have to take for thinking that a 40-centimetre putt isn’t a gimme? The Americans really should have thanked me in Germany, because there’s little doubt that the controversy on the Saturday fired up the entire team ahead of Sunday’s singles matches. We went into the singles matches with a relatively comfortable 10-6 lead. But the whole crew fought like wild animals and claimed eight of the 12 matches, winning the Solheim Cup overall by 14½ points to our 13½. After two straight victories in the cup, we were beaten to a pulp on our home ground and personally, I was on the ropes – not because I lost my singles match against Angela Stanford but because the media pressure kept on growing.
But I wasn’t out for the count. Because once I’d had a chance to catch my breath and get over the first explosion, I quickly registered that the picture was more balanced than I’d first thought. I also had a lot of supporters out there who either thought Alison Lee should have taken the putt or, regardless of that, simply backed me up in the storm. Or both. Although they were the ones who threw me under the bus, alone and struggling, I also got a lot of support from golfing’s inner circle – and that was crucial in helping me get back up on my feet in the early days. When Michelle Wie – the first American to do so – approached me already in Germany and said, ‘I’m coming to you as a friend now, Tutta,’ that set the tears streaming. Because it meant so very much. And when Anna Nordqvist went into the studio on the USA’s Golf Channel just a few days later and publicly supported me, I felt a profound gratitude and respect, and thought she was one hell of a good, tough pal. Norway’s Golf Association gave me its full support when Jon Karlsen was quick to make a statement to the media: ‘We can’t have match play developing in such a way that the players get to decide for themselves which putts they’ll get given.’ Jon also criticised our captains’ team for poor leadership: ‘Lee messed up. It’s a shame to see that this incident was compounded by weak coaching and leadership from the European captains.’ So the picture wasn’t entirely black-and-white. When I flew home to Orlando on Monday morning, I was very tense about my reception in the USA. Both from people on the street and on the golf course. After all, it was a fellow countrywoman and one of their
own players who had started crying on the 17th green in Germany. I crashed utterly when I landed in Orlando on Monday evening. I came through the door at 7.30pm and was asleep before my head hit the pillow, waking again, totally jet-lagged at 4am. Dan Levy, the good, solid agent from my US management company, rang on the door at 8am. Then we spent two solid days in a crisis meeting. Kraig Kann of the LPGA came. I was in safe hands and got the best help. When I ventured out into the world at last, the Americans proved to be generous and accommodating, because it all went surprisingly well. All I got were a few mean comments and isolated incidents, like when I was training on a course down in Jupiter, between Orlando and Miami, a couple of days after coming back from Germany. When I came out of the clubhouse again after lunch to get started on my second round of the day, somebody had been busy – they’d stuck a big label on my golf bag: We don’t want to see you on this golf course.’ I threw it in the bin and played my second round. ‘Take it easy, Tutta. You’ll just have to expect this kind of thing for a while. And maybe people will shout things like DON’T PICK UP THAT BALL when you’re playing tournaments in the USA again.’ This was Butch Harmon who shared his observations with me as he offered me support and good advice once I was back in the USA. Along with Phil Mickelson on the men’s PGA tour in particular, Butch became an invaluable friend and support in the time that followed in the US. Both men had been through the mill themselves and knew from personal experience how the media works. And they had good advice about how I should handle the early days. They thought I should go into the TV studio.
At first I resisted, thinking that issuing a public apology had to be enough. Dad backed me up: ‘That’s right, Tutta, you’ve said sorry. Can’t you just let it lie now?’ But after a while I started to wonder because Phil and Butch were so insistent and told me that I’d have to confront the accusations that had been hurled at me sooner or later, so it was smartest to create a setting where I got to tell my side of the story in peace and calm. I trusted their advice. I ended up going on the air with one of the Golf Channel’s biggest anchors, Tim Rosaforte. But I wanted to avoid being interviewed live because it’s so easy to be caught out and knocked off balance. Instead, my home in Orlando was set up as a TV studio for two days. It looked like a major Hollywood production. The result was a half-hour feature where I could tell my side of the story. It felt good. I got so much great help when I came home from Germany that I pretty quickly started to feel certain it would just glance off me if anybody tried to use the incident on the 17th green at St. Leon-Rot Golf Club against me – whether in an LPGA tournament or in the next Solheim Cup, which would take place in Iowa, USA, in 2017. I was already looking forward to it because I wanted to get my revenge there! If I had to sum up the 2015 Solheim Cup, I’d say that the saddest thing to happen to me there was being robbed of the good feeling I’ve always associated with that tournament. But I would win it back in Iowa.
(p. 416-419)
Bowing Out Marina Alex has just missed her putt for the USA and is watching from the edge of the green. I’ve squeezed the trigger and set in motion the most important putt of my life. Now I’m absolutely alone and there is no way back – because a millisecond ago, I released my trigger, straight back, passing the point where I handed control of the movement to my putter and let the club go. Now it’s no longer in my hands but I feel completely at peace when the blade of the club approaches the ball, where my focus, my gaze are centred. But the only thing I actually see is the images rolling up the screen in my head of the ball tracking on the line towards the hole and dropping in the cup. Dead centre. In my visualisation, I see no possibility of missing this putt. So I feel a rock-solid certainty. Marina Alex will not get another chance because this is my moment. I own it and love it. I know that the ball is going in because I have seen it so clearly in my visualisation. In that instant the world stands still. Teetering. Not a second ticks past. Everything is on pause. Then the putter strikes the ball. Clinically clean. The ball vanishes off the club head at the right angle, the right spin and the right speed. Perfect! I’ve scored ten out of ten on the elements of the stroke within my control. It’ll take a lot now for that ball not to go into the hole. I see out of the left-hand corner of my eye that it’s tracking in exactly the same line I had in my head and long before it drops, I see that I’ve taken command and nailed it. My mind is clear of all that surrounds it. You could have dropped
a bomb and I wouldn’t have noticed it. My teammates, the public and the pressure – all of it has been erased. Totally gone. But when I see the ball track steadily along the line to the hole, I drop my club and start to celebrate. Fifty tonnes fall from my shoulders, because this is a home run. The USA is beaten. For a brief second, the world stood teetering between the peace I felt in my visualisation because I saw the ball going in the hole and the explosion of feelings that I knew would come, because I was so sure of sinking the putt. But I didn’t start my celebration too early because then I could easily miss. I reined myself in when my peace could have been blasted to shreds. I was patient and took the time to control my breathing and focus on the job in hand. I harnessed my forces and mastered the immensely tough balancing act. Mentally, I am empty. Bone-dry. But I have passed the test. That is what I remember from the very last putt of my career. The rest is history. Which starts when I see my team come storming out onto the green, with Bronte Law and Carlota Ciganda in the lead, closely followed by our captain, Catriona Matthew, who sat on her haunches, hands folded, as I played my putt. But the first person I hug is my rival, Marina Alex. ‘Thanks for the match – what a finish we created together.’ I am ecstatic to have won the duel but I want to show her respect. ‘This is it!’ Mel Reid yells into my face at the top of her lungs before throwing her arms around my neck. The victory rush is starting to build. We fire each other up. The joy, and the relief, are immense. Mike, calm personified, is trembling when he comes over to me.
‘This tops it all, Tutta. I look like a total idiot out here – I can’t even put the flag back. I can’t get it the hole.’ I can sense it in the celebration that has started: that of all the magical moments I’ve had in my career this is the greatest. A series of chances led to my match in particular, the tenth of the day, being the one that decided this year’s Solheim Cup, but I seized the chance when it fell in my lap. I came into the tournament after a break of nearly two years from competition golf, with the odds stacked high against me. But battling from that position has always triggered me. I’ve shown myself, and others, that I’m not finished. It feels so good to have succeeded. ‘Weren’t you ever afraid you’d miss that putt, Tutta?’ Carlota asks me out on the green. ‘Of course I was. It’s only a few hours since I spent half the night racked with doubt and brooding over the fact that I missed the deciding putt in yesterday’s match. Have I lost it? But after I’d read the line and stood over the ball, it wasn’t fear of missing but the yearning to celebrate that could have ruined things today.’ But now that doubt is laid to rest. Now I can stand tall because I know for absolutely certain that I still have it. I may not the toughest talent on the greens but I can still deliver when the pressure is at its peak and everything is at stake. With this knowledge, everything falls into place inside me on the 18th green at Gleneagles. Now all I want to do is hold Herman in my arms and when my gaze finally lands on my family in the vast ocean of people, I am filled with a feeling of happiness unlike anything I’ve ever felt before. Because it feels complete. It is in the next few minutes that I make the decision to retire and
bow out. And the next hour will be insane, filled with many emotions and a press conference in which I announce that my time as an active player is over. It takes some time because there are a thousand questions. One of them is, of course: ‘What if you hadn’t holed that putt – would you have retired then?’ There were several variants on that question and each time, it was equally delightful to be able to answer: ‘You know what, luckily that’s not a question I need to worry about.’ Once the press has got what it wants, I put Herman on my shoulders and wander back to the hotel with Christian. There, waiting for us, are the people who have been my core group on this tour: Mum, Dad, Gunerius, Christian’s dad and his girlfriend. It’s the first time I’m meeting them after the match, but they’ve already heard that I’m retiring. Mum is in ecstasy. Dad is relieved. For at least half a year he’s been nagging me to plan my exit and barely a week ago, he challenged me at a family dinner in Norway: ‘Do you have to go to Scotland to play, Tutta, and risk playing a mediocre match? Why not just pack it in now?’ I love Dad and I also love the fact that he’s always so straighttalking. But criticism from my nearest and dearest has always been the toughest thing for me to handle. His words at that family dinner fell on such stony ground that I left the dinner table in a rage, saying ‘Can’t you just pull yourself together, Dad, and let me play in Scotland in peace? I have no plans to give up yet!’ But now the mood is utterly different. Everybody is relieved and happy about our victory in the Solheim Cup and what Dad said at the
family dinner is forgotten. Or rather, it isn’t entirely forgotten, not by everybody. Because Dad, who isn’t usually one to admit his errors, has something on his mind. ‘Tutta, I think it was a very wise choice you made, to play in Scotland.’ That’s all, but it’s enough. Because it’s his way of saying he’s proud of me and it’s an acknowledgement of my choice. ‘Yes, Dad. Your daughter isn’t stupid, you know. She knows which opportunities to seize.’ The mood is set, and now I can enjoy the company of my loved ones and loosen up. Time passes and we arrive late at the celebratory dinner with the rest of the European team, where I’m lavished with compliments and warm hugs. The tears flow more readily with every hug and by half past ten I’m already so pumped that I leave the party to get a bit of alone time for the first time that day. I need a break with Herman whose nearness I’ve missed so intensely during the week. The room is pitch dark. Herman is sound asleep. His breathing is the only thing I can hear as I sit down in the comfy armchair by the cot, take his hand and start to cry, to snivel like a little kid. Everything crashes down inside me and there’s nothing I can do to stop it. I’ve experienced so much, so many things, for such a long time and now it’s all over. For the first time today, I also open my phone, which has exploded with hundreds of messages of congratulations and thanks from friends and acquaintances and players I’ve competed against all over the world in the past twenty years. I am so moved. Overwhelmed. I’ve always thought ahead in my career. Next, next, next. Now I’m thinking back and becoming more
and more tearful. It’s a total crisis. I tell myself that I have to pull myself together because maybe I’ll pop back into the party again. I go to the bathroom and splash my face with cold water. I look at myself in the mirror and am embarrassed: my face is smeared with make-up. I fix myself up as best I can. But it’s probably dark down there at the party. And even if people can see how terrible I look, I can live with that too. There’s no rush to go back to the others, though, because right now all I want to do is sit here with Herman. Savour the peace, listen to his breathing and let my thoughts flow freely. Yes, I have done a lot of doubting over the past couple of years. But when I woke up this morning, the Tokyo Olympics were still a goal. Yet when I saw Christian on the course with Herman on his back, along with the rest of my family, I knew it was over. I could win another major. I could win an Olympic gold medal. But I know what it costs and I can’t face it. I don’t want to. Because you know what, Herman: Mum has played golf for so many years that no matter how many more tournaments she goes on to win, her life can’t possibly be any better than it is now with you, Dad and the rest of our fantastic family. Perhaps you won’t remember that you came along here to Scotland with Mum and Dad. But one day, Mum will tell you a bit more about the life she’s lived. Now there’s just one thing you need to know. It’s over and I am contented.
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