LPGA Tour rookie Katelyn Dambaugh has played events this season in the Bahamas, Australia, Hawaii, Arizona and California. Sweet destinations by any standard, with culture, sun and scenery to spare.
Unless you live in South Carolina and hate flying more than triple-bogeys.
“It’s getting better,” Dambaugh said Friday at the Kingsmill Championship. “You just have to get used to it. I just get scared of the bumps and the takeoff.”
Dambaugh’s golf has improved this week, too, and not because she could drive here.
Dambaugh finished second at the 2013 Women’s Eastern Amateur at Kingsmill, three shots behind Ashlan Ramsey, then ranked the world’s No. 1 female amateur. Course and golfer have changed over the years, but the familiarity clearly helped.
Rounds of 3-under-par 68 on Thursday and Friday are Dambaugh’s first sub-70 scores on the LPGA Tour and leave her five shots behind leader In Gee Chun. She has hit 21 of 28 fairways and 28 of 36 greens in regulation, both frequencies well above her season averages.
But golfers are finicky. Depending on luck, layout and conditions, they may consider yesterday’s 71 better than today’s 68.
So were Thursday and Friday indeed the highlights of Dambaugh’s year? She did, after all, tie for 19th in Australia with four consecutive rounds of par or better.
“On Tour, yeah,” said Dambaugh, the only left-hander in the Kingsmill field. “I’ve just been working really hard on my ball-striking and proximity to the hole and my putting, which has really been the key for me.”
The Australian tournament was in mid-February, and Dambaugh hasn’t approached that caliber of play since. At her most recent tournament, last month in the San Francisco area, she closed with a pair of 80s.
That’s humbling for anyone, especially someone fresh off a dream year.
Dambaugh won the 2017 Southeastern Conference individual title, led South Carolina to its third consecutive NCAA regional championship and set a school record for lowest career scoring average. She turned pro, joined the Symetra Tour in June and posted top-10s in half of her 12 tournaments.
By season’s end, Dambaugh was No. 10 on the money list and No. 3 in scoring average, success that earned her LPGA Tour privileges for 2018.
But as in all sports, the transition from a developmental circuit to The Show is difficult. In golf, the fields are better, courses tougher, stakes higher.
Just consider Dambaugh’s company at 6 under par. Anna Nordqvist is a two-time major champion and ranked No. 12 in the world. Karrie Webb is a Hall of Famer and former Kingsmill winner. Moriya Jutanugarn is a newly minted Tour champion and ranked 11th in the world.
Dambaugh is ranked 383rd, a Friday curiosity who, by tournament’s end, could be forgotten, or celebrating a breakout performance. Such is golf, a four-day exam for more than 100 competitors, legions of whom pop on, and off, the leaderboard.
“It’s not as good as I want it to be, obviously,” Dambaugh said of her rookie year. “But coming in here I knew it was going to be difficult. Just being a rookie and getting the experience is all I’m really trying to do. Just get as comfortable as I can.”
Dambaugh’s off-the-course comfort is rooted in her faith, and Christian music — Chris Tomlin and Matt Maher are favorites — calms her during those flights. Faith was also invaluable six years ago when a suicide bomber in Afghanistan killed a close family friend whom Dambaugh called “my brother.”
His name was David Gray, an Air Force officer, and Dambaugh was a flower girl in his wedding. He is survived by his wife and three young children, and Dambaugh honors him with a black wristband that bears his name.
The uplifting news is that Dambaugh said Gray’s children and widow are doing well.
There’s some perspective when you’re worried about iron accuracy and putts that lipped out.
“I missed three 7-footers for birdie on front side,” Dambaugh said. “It could have been better, but I’m not complaining.”
No reason to. She’s less than six months into a promising LPGA Tour career, and earlier this month she qualified for her first U.S. Women’s Open, set to be played in two weeks.
Better yet, the Open is in Shoal Creek, Ala., a seven-hour drive from Dambaugh’s Charleston, S.C., base. No flight necessary.
