Karrie Webb's greatest hour was touched by tragedy on Sunday. Minutes after becoming the youngest woman to complete a career grand slam, by winning the LPGA Championship in Delaware, the 26-year-old Australian revealed that she had nearly not played the final round.

At a tearful press conference Webb said that only six hours before her 2 p.m. tee time she had booked a flight home to Queensland, where her grandfather Mick Collinson, who introduced her to golf, lay seriously ill after a stroke.

"Right now," she said of her incredible achievement in winning five of the past eight majors, including the slam, "it doesn't really mean a whole lot to me." Webb told of an emotional family meeting at 8 a.m. on Sunday morning at which she decided to go back but was prevailed upon by her father and mother to stay.

"I had decided that I wouldn't play," Webb said afterwards, "but my dad didn't feel too good about that. He'd spoken to other members of the family and they all said that grandad would have wanted me to stay. So while her father and mother, Rob and Evelyn Webb, flew back to Australia, Karrie stayed, and won the championship for the man who had first taken her out on a golf course, when she was only four. She won by two shots from Laura Diaz, with a total of 270, 14 under par, with Maria Hjorth and Wendy Ward finishing joint third on 10 under.

"Emotionally I just didn't have golf"I don't sit down and look at record books," said Webb, "and try to beat them. I just try and play good golf. Along the way I've broken some records, and this is a really big one. It will sink in eventually and it will be really special."