Minjee Lee has spent these previous few years feeling golf’s glories and agonies greater than most.
She gained her first main match on the 2021 Evian Championship, a come-from-behind playoff victory, and adopted it lower than a 12 months later with a record-setting win on the 2022 U.S. Ladies’s Open. Then got here a tie for forty third when she tried to defend her Evian title, worries about exhaustion and a pair of irritating finishes within the first two majors of this 12 months.
Now ranked sixth on the earth after reaching No. 2 final summer season, Lee, a 27-year-old Australian, should conquer Pebble Seashore Golf Hyperlinks — the famend course on the California coast — if she is to defend her Open title. The match begins Thursday.
In a springtime interview at T.P.C. Harding Park in San Francisco, Lee mentioned her masterful iron play, the hazards of Pebble Seashore, the evolution of the ladies’s recreation and why successful a significant as soon as, by no means thoughts twice, is so troublesome.
This interview has been edited for size and readability.
You haven’t missed a lower at a significant since 2019.
I didn’t even know.
How a lot of that represents a development of your athletic expertise versus your mind-set?
You’re all the time attempting to get a bit of bit higher every day. So for me, for my development and never having missed a lower over that time frame, I really feel like I’ve put in loads of hours and energy into my recreation and bettering every day. It simply reveals my consistency over X period of time.
How did successful the Evian Championship in 2021 form the next years?
It was a little bit of a reduction as a result of there was loads of speak: “When is she going to win her first main?” I heard loads of issues, however they have been by no means to my face. They have been all the time in passing or social media or loads of issues right here and there. So it was type of a reduction, a monkey off my again. I knew I had it in me, but it surely lastly occurred — like, to truly get a win in a significant is actually, actually onerous.
You all the time work towards successful majors, and your objectives are very particular, so for that to be my first one, it led into my subsequent 12 months, as effectively.
And as you realized final 12 months at Evian, defending a championship is tough to do.
Oh, yeah. It’s actually onerous.
Going into Pebble Seashore, how do you method attempting to defend a significant?
The toughest factor is to do your regular factor. Often whenever you’re defending, you’re pulled in loads of completely different instructions: media, your apply rounds, you place in loads of work as a result of it’s a brand new venue and you need to do your entire prep ranging from scratch.
It’s not like Evian, the place I already knew the golf course and had performed it for years. [This year], will probably be a bit of bit completely different. The U.S. Open has all the time meant lots to me and to have the ability to win it was a dream come true for me. I don’t know the way it will really feel driving in there as a defending champion.
The wind might be an element at Pebble Seashore. You grew up in Australia and handled the wind. You reside in Texas and cope with the wind. Does it really feel like a bonus this 12 months?
I like taking part in within the wind — I like a troublesome check of golf. I simply really feel like you possibly can actually use your creativity when it’s windy. Low photographs are key, but it surely’s not all the time simply the low photographs. Are you going to make use of the wind? Are you going to struggle the wind? It’s simply loads of alternative ways which you can play within the wind. I discover it extra enjoyable when it’s more durable, and since it actually separates who is an efficient ball-striker and who isn’t nearly as good, it actually separates the sphere. I’ve all the time performed in wind, so it doesn’t actually really feel that completely different for me.
There usually are not many higher iron gamers on the planet. Do you end up nonetheless emphasizing irons whenever you apply and put together, or are you able to afford to spend extra time on different issues?
I by no means actually felt like I used to be higher in that facet till I noticed the stat. Yeah, positive, my stats have been higher than the lads, however I by no means actually particularly labored on my irons — like, I all the time labored on my approach or how I transfer a sure means for a sure shot. However final 12 months, it simply occurred to be higher than another 12 months, and I’m undecided what actually modified. It simply type of occurred. You simply work on one thing for therefore lengthy, after which at one level, it simply clicks. I in all probability don’t work on my swing as a lot proper now; I’m engaged on different elements of my recreation, however solely as a result of these different areas are the place I’d profit essentially the most.
You’ve mentioned you don’t take note of stats, however you set the Open scoring file final 12 months, incomes the very best payout in historical past ($1.8 million) for girls’s golf. Do you concentrate on these sorts of superlatives?
I really feel like I don’t — not as a lot as I ought to. I in all probability ought to have a look at it and suppose, “Oh, you probably did very well,” after which praise myself. I simply do my work, and once I’m away from the golf course, I don’t take into consideration golf.
There’s a second within the Netflix documentary sequence “Full Swing” when Brooks Koepka talks about how golf is a recreation the place, when issues are going effectively, you suppose you’re by no means going to lose it, and when it’s not going effectively, you suppose you’ll by no means discover your means again. This 12 months hasn’t been a glide path for you. The place are you on that continuum?
I had an low season, like I all the time would in that time frame, after which performed Asia and didn’t have that good of outcomes. I used to be like, I’m simply going to take just a few weeks extra at dwelling, and I missed three occasions and that occurred to be six weeks.
Time went so shortly, and I used to be like, I’ve spent eight years going full-throttle, I’m allowed to take that point for myself. So I did, and I really feel good. I really feel fairly refreshed. First week was Chevron — a significant coming again for the primary week — and I’m slowly working again into taking part in rhythms.
You modified caddies not too long ago. How has it affected you on the course?
I’ve truly realized lots about myself. While you’re youthful, you rely lots in your caddie, and I believe I did that for fairly a very long time, simply because I used to be younger and didn’t know what I wished as a lot. Now I do know myself a bit higher and I’ve matured much more.
It simply appears like I do know what I would like in a caddie and all that I want from my caddie. I don’t want the reassurance; I do know what I’m doing. I simply want anyone who is aware of me effectively, who’s going to be a very good companion out on the golf course. We spend a lot time with them on the golf course, it’s like if you happen to don’t like that particular person, it’s simply not going to work.
That is the primary U.S. Ladies’s Open at Pebble Seashore, someplace that looms giant in golf’s creativeness. What’s the larger milestone for girls’s golf: that the Open is being performed at Pebble Seashore, or that final 12 months’s British Open was at Muirfield, the place girls couldn’t even be members till 2017?
I’m a bit of bit blended in that facet. I’m actually pleased and grateful that we have been in a position to play at Muirfield and have entry to the golf course, and being at Pebble for the primary time. I do know that loads of work goes into having these championships there. It’s not straightforward — nothing is straightforward, proper? — however I’m a bit of bit bittersweet that it took this a lot time to get the ladies on these golf programs. I’m very appreciative of the excursions and the U.S. Golf Affiliation and all of our sponsors for actually pushing the ladies’s recreation and the L.P.G.A. to go to all of those nice venues now, and I do know it’s solely going to get higher.
However I really feel prefer it was a very long time coming.
In February, you mentioned certainly one of your objectives was to not be completely exhausted by the tip of 2023. We’ve seen an increasing number of elite athletes speak about burnout, psychological sickness, melancholy and exhaustion. How a lot of that weighs in your thoughts as you’re attempting to type out when to play?
I’ve all the time had fairly a full 12 months. I’ve performed loads of occasions, and that’s what I actually wished to do. I wished to play. However now I wish to play much less — like, I don’t wish to be as drained coming right down to some actually essential occasions on the finish of the 12 months.
Now my priorities are completely different. I don’t have to spend all of my time taking part in each single occasion, attempting to maintain my card as a rookie. I’m getting older, so I wish to take care of my physique, take care of my thoughts. That’s what’s going to assist me carry out my finest, so I believe that’s why loads of athletes at the moment are speaking about caring for your well-being, caring for your thoughts, the place you’re in your life. Simply to be wholesome inside and outside I believe is actually essential, and if no person talks about it, no person will actually learn about it both, so you possibly can’t get the correct assist if you happen to want it.
Does having gained two majors make it easier to really feel liberated which you can take the breaks and take the pauses — that there’s perhaps rather less to show?
Probably not. I’ve by no means actually considered it in that means. Clearly, I’m hungry for extra: I wish to win the opposite majors, and I don’t suppose that may ever change. And I’ve been near world No. 1 a few instances however not fairly received over the road. So I nonetheless have lots to indicate. I’ve loads of struggle left in me. I nonetheless have loads of drive.
You performed for the primary time whenever you have been about 10. Wanting again, do you want you had began earlier? Began later?
It was a very good age for me. I swam and I performed golf. I didn’t know what I wished to do, and I simply tried a bunch of issues: completely different sports activities, dance, music, the whole lot. I used to be lucky that my mother and father let me strive the whole lot. I simply discovered it in golf, and I actually loved practising and going and seeing my mates on the golf course. I used to hit these squishy golf balls round on the chipping inexperienced, and it was simply enjoyable. The best way I received into it, I believe it was the appropriate means.
Was golf your finest sport?
Effectively, I’ve fairly good hand-eye coordination, however I believe as a result of we have been actually a golfy household — my mother and father and my brother and my grandparents, all of them liked taking part in golf, so we have been simply all the time round it.
As a two-time Olympian, do you wish to play in Paris subsequent 12 months?
That’s fairly excessive on my checklist. I believe Paris might be a fairly superb turnout. The Olympics are in all probability the best honor you possibly can have of representing your nation, so I believe that’s going to be certainly one of my greater objectives for subsequent 12 months.
However Pebble Seashore comes first. When do you begin taking part in it in your head?
I’m not likely a look-up-the-golf-course-beforehand type of woman. I’ve seen some holes on TV however nothing an excessive amount of intimately.
I like seeing the course and actually visualizing it once I get there. I wouldn’t have the ability to inform if I did it on the map. I similar to to internalize it once I get there.