“Trust Yourself” – A Gifted Teen Golfer was Taught by Golf Legend

A ‘golf legend’ and a ‘gifted teen golfer’ met each other.

The place they met was a pro-am tournament of the U.S. PGA Champion’s Tour Wendy’s Champions Skins Game (the total prize money is $600,000.) at Wailea GC (72 pars), on January 1 in Hawaii.

American Jack Nicklaus (age 64) asked Michelle Wie (whose Korean name is Wie seong-mi, age 14) on which tee she would like to play before they teed off, which means he gave her the right to choose her teeing ground, a comment on her excellent playing ability.

Michelle Wie, who had a match with male golfers in the OPGA tour, answered, “She’d like to play here on the back tee.” Nicolas smiled, saying, “You want to play on the back tee (with me). And you want to bring me to shame.” With such a happy psychological warfare from the first hole, Michelle overwhelmed him with her own long hit. She said “He drives twice as far as me.”

However, with the confidence of 73 glorious victories in the PGA tour including 18 in major league, Nicklaus coached her by showing his elaborate iron shot. All of the rest of amateur players used a regular tee.

Michelle Wie, followed by hundreds of spectators, offered her appreciation to him by saying, “Among the many lessons Nicklaus gave me today, his advice that I must trust myself was the most impressive one.” Before the match started, she got his autograph as well as those of other past star American golfers including Arnold Palmer, Lee Trevino, and Tom Watson.

Watson won the championship by taking 10 skins for two days, earning $400,000. Palmer won $140,000 by 5 skins and Nicklaus won $60,000 by 3 skins, respectively. Trevino, the most recent champion, failed to win any prizes.

Jong-Seok Kim kjs0123@donga.com