Sorenstam will move on after missing PGA cut

By Mark Herrmann
Newsday

Sweden's Annika Sorenstam was a woman of many emotions during yesterday's second round of the Bank of America Colonial. Sorenstam shot a 4-over-par 74. Associated Press

She cried a little as she walked off the 18th green to the kind of reception a champion usually gets. She cried more when she tried to explain what it was like to make history and miss the cut.

"I'm living the dream I want to live, I'm doing what I want to do," she said, pausing to gather herself after her second and final round at the Bank of America Colonial. "Why the tears come, I don't know. I didn't want it to end."

Had she shot par in the second round yesterday, a score that had seemed well within her reach during a remarkably poised round Thursday, it wouldn't have ended. She would have made the cut with a 70. But her approach shots weren't as accurate as they had been during her first-round 71, and her short game wasn't good enough to save her. She shot 4-over 74 and finished her two rounds at 5-over.

So she will leave the Colonial to the likes of Kenny Perry and Dan Forsman, who are tied for the lead at 8-under, and Jim Furyk, who is one shot back. She will leave to go back — forever, she said — to the LPGA Tour. But she left the golf world a lot different than it had been before she became the first woman in 58 years to play in a PGA Tour event.

Sorenstam approached the final green applauding the fans who had treated her like a Masters champion on every hole. After she made a 14-foot uphill putt for par, she tossed her ball into the crowd, as tournament winners often do. She hugged Dean Wilson and Aaron Barber, the two Tour rookies who played both rounds with her. Then she cried.

Later, she was asked if she would go back on her vow that this would literally be a once-in-a-lifetime chance on the PGA Tour. "No, I won't reconsider," she said. "I'm very thankful and honored to have been here but I know where I belong, and I'm going to go back with all the experience I learned this week. I want to win tournaments, I want to set records and this week here is going to help me to do that."

She did finish ahead of 11 golfers, including Barber (6 over), who had helped make her so emotional on the 18th green. "We just said what a pleasure the last couple of days have been," he said. "We were having so much fun out there, but there was so much pressure on her, it was a relief, I think, to be done. We exchanged phone numbers and e-mail addresses and we're going to be friends for life because of this."

If only she could have made some birdie putts. Sorenstam made only one yesterday, a six-footer on the 400-yard, par-4 second. Her round turned sour on the 470-yard, par-4 fifth, which she called the hardest hole she ever has played. Her drive went right and hit a tree. She hit two 8-irons and a chip to get within 14 feet, then made a good putt to save bogey.

Her swing wasn't as rhythmic as it had been Thursday. She followed with bogeys on the sixth, eighth, 10th and 12th. Still, people who were at the Colonial Country Club felt she aced the place. "I think she played great under all that pressure, and I'm glad she played well," said Carl Pettersson, a Tour rookie and fellow Swede. "She definitely goes up in my rankings."

Said Luke Donald, another up-and-coming player: "She proved she deserved to be here."

Sorenstam was gratified by admiring words from a few veteran players in the Colonial field, those who she said "had said less positive things."

She will take that encouragement back to the LPGA Tour next week. "Well, I've got the weekend off, so I've got time to rest," she said, adding that it was draining, having traversed what she had called her own personal Mount Everest.

"I've climbed as high as I can," she said. "It was worth every step of it. I won't do this again, but I will always remember it."

She is not the only one.