BUNKER MENTALITY
Gender
Defender As Mike Wilson argues, it’s high time for golf to take a look from tennis, where men’s and women’s prize money is – at the ‘Majors’ at least - equal.
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ow we are officially in autumn. It’s time to air that hoary old chestnut that is a firm favourite of Bunker Mentality, namely the vast, iniquitous and outdated differential in prize money earned by male and female professional golfers around the world. And, with the winner of his national Ladies Scottish Open this year making a mere 18.5% of her male equivalent. It is 10 years since the last of the four tennis ‘Majors,’ Wimbledon, introduced equal prize money for the men’s and women’s singles and getting on for half-a-century since the U.S. Open became the first of the sport’s Grand Slam events to offer equal remuneration for both sexes. Of course, the arguments raged then - as they still do to a much lesser extent - not so much on the point of principle. But on the fact that the winner of this year’s women’s singles title at the U.S. Open will win the same amount - US$3.5m - as the men’s singles champion whilst playing a maximum of three sets per match compared to the gruelling maximum of five required of the men. A nd , i n some re spec t s, t hat ’s a fa i r
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argument, equal pay for equal work. But don’t expect the men to be having their workload reduced or the women theirs substantially increased anytime soon. However, it seems as if professional golf is stuck in a time warp. Women, playing exactly the same 72 holes in their U.S. Open and Women’s British Open as the men, admittedly slightly shorter holes to take cognisance of the respective hitting power of the genders. But the best female players in the world face exactly the same challenges as their male counterparts, challenges which include playing under pressure, competing against the very best of the rest, playing in wind and rain, out of bunkers and the rough, avoiding out-ofbounds and that cruellest of all mistresses, Lady Luck herself. Having covered four open championships in the month of July, the Scottish Open followed by the Open Championship at Royal Birkdale, then the Ladies Scottish Open and finally the Ricoh Women’s British Open, the most striking differences were how much fun the women’s events were to cover as a journalist. More so for those intrepid photographers how much the female players seemed to be enjoying - as opposed to the men seemingly
Korea's In-Kyung Kim celebrates with the trophy after her victory in the 2017 Women's British Open Golf Championship at Kingsbarns Golf Links - she earned 27% of US$1.9m won by Jordan Spieth at Royal Birkdale HKGOLFER.COM
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