Former US women’s golf prodigy Michelle Wie West told GolfWeek magazine that she will be putting her career on hold the day after the 77th US Women’s Open taking place next week at Pine Needles. Lodge & Golf Club in North Carolina.
As a young mother, the 32-year-old golfer can no longer train physically enough to participate in regular LPGA tournaments. She says in particular that she sometimes has a hard time hugging her own daughter Makenna.
“I’m not ruling out anything at all.” Michelle Wie West grants when the journalist raises the possibility of a return, but explains the main reason for this early retirement: “Sometimes when I play a lot of golf. I only have strength to go to bed. I can’t take my daughter (Makenna) and that worries me.”
The Wei Phenomenon
Winner of the 2014 US Women’s Open at Pinehurst, also in North Carolina, Wie, who rose to fame when she was just 12, has had an injury-plagued career. This season, the American, a Stanford graduate, has only been able to line up in one tournament.
Michelle Wie, the youngest player ever to qualify for an LPGA tournament, has just five wins to her name, including this major success, when for the first time men and women played the US Open on the same course with one week. Of diference.
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Accomplished woman instead of champion
In the early 2010s, tired of her media overexposure, the teenager joined Stanford University to further her studies and get away from the golf course.
In 2019, determined to live her life as a woman, she married Jerry West, the son of a famous basketball player with whom she had a daughter in 2020.
“Because I accomplished both (graduated from Stanford and won the US Open), I think I’m very happy to announce this decision now. I think if I hadn’t won the US Open, I would still be on tour week in and week out fighting for that US Open win. I don’t regret it because I feel like I always learned from every mistake I made. »
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