Sport

Sky's the limit for Swede's success

Women's tour :  They thought it couldn't get any better, but it did

Tue Oct 29 2002 - 00:00

Women's tour:  They thought it couldn't get any better, but it did. They thought the Far Eastern invasion force would reduce her dominance of the women's game, but it didn't. In this past crazy season, which has seen her put one trophy beside another onto her sideboard, Annika Sorenstam - all five feet six inches of her - has strode the fairways of the US LPGA Tour like a giant, writes Philip Reid.

Last year, when the Swede won eight titles on the most competitive women's circuit of them all, people shook their heads in wonder. This year, she beat that record, and they're shaking their heads all the harder. Her recent win in the Samsung World Championship was her ninth tournament win of the season, and just where it will all stop nobody knows.

Sorenstam has played 19 times on the LPGA Tour this season and finished in the top 10 a remarkable 17 times. Perhaps more remarkably, she has a strike rate of wins that's the envy of every golfer on the planet. Her nine tournaments in 2002 have netted her prize money of $2,408,907 and, for good measure, she also won on two other occasions away from her home tour: in the Australian Masters and the Compaq Open in Sweden.

Her nine wins in the United States came in the Takefuji Classic, the Kraft Nabisco Championship, the USA Championship, the Kellogg Classic, the Evian Masters, the LPGA Classic, the Williams Championship and the Samsung. She also placed second at the US Open and lost a play-off to

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Rachel Teske in the PING tournament.

If her opponents felt that Sorenstam, who turned 32 earlier this month, was starting to lose her hunger for titles, there is no evidence of that from the Swede hereself.

"I don't believe that you can limit yourself. That's what keeps me going forward. I still think I can improve in every area of my game. You should be able to birdie every hole, to shoot a round of 54. So, why should you limit yourself? The sky is the limit."

If that's any indication, then Sorenstam intends to leave even bigger footprints all over the fairways of the LPGA Tour in 2003 . . . and who would bet against that happening?