CNN
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As Linn Grant left the course at Halmstad Golf Membership in Tylösand, Sweden, she discovered herself swarmed by a bunch of younger followers.
Clamoring for something and every part within the Swede’s golf bag, they excitedly waved pens within the hopes of securing an autograph. Grant duly obliged, signing every part from hats to golf balls.
It was a buzz worthy of a landmark achievement: Grant had simply turn out to be the first-ever feminine winner on the DP World Tour along with her victory on the Scandinavian Combined occasion on June 12.
And as if making historical past wasn’t sufficient, she did so in dominant style, cruising the 156-player discipline. A weekend-best eight-under 64 on the ultimate day confirmed an emphatic win, with Grant’s 24-under par seeing her end 9 photographs away from runners up Marc Warren and fellow Swede Henrik Stenson, and 14 photographs away from the subsequent feminine participant, Gabriella Cowley.
The win was made all of the sweeter by the truth that it was a victory at house – in all senses of the phrase. Boyfriend Pontus Samuelsson caddied, with family and friends supporting amongst an ecstatic Swedish crowd.
“The environment there, I may really feel that,” Grant instructed CNN Sport. “I felt that it was simply because I used to be from there, however after sitting within the automobile on my manner house, I noticed social media calls, journalists reaching out – every part simply grew … it’s a bit insane.”
Minjee Lee’s win on the US Girls’s Open per week prior had seen the Australian scoop $1.8 million, the largest payout in women’s golf history. But Lee’s unprecedented earnings had been dwarfed by the major-record $3.15 million taken house by England’s Matt Fitzpatrick for winning the men’s event only one week later.
Together with her historic win making worldwide headlines, Grant is optimistic her success will assist the ladies’s recreation take one other step ahead.
“I believe lots of people can relate to girls’s golf,” maybe much more so than the boys’s recreation, she stated, as a result of “they [men] hit to date and the programs usually are not lengthy sufficient.”
“I hope it’ll have some kind of impact that folks may take a look at it and see we’re a bunch of gamers who’re this good, hit the ball far sufficient, hit it shut sufficient, maintain the putts and rating effectively.
“I simply hope extra individuals understand that. After which we glance higher and we’re nicer too!” Grant added with fun.
Having solely turned 23 per week after the win, victory in Halmstad marked the newest peak in what has been a meteoric rise for Grant since turning skilled in 2021.
Three wins in 4 months on the Girls European Tour (LET) have helped rocket Grant to second within the rankings in The Race to Costa del Sol, a 28-tournament LET season set to crown a winner on the Andalucía Costa del Sol Open de España in November. Extremely, she leads the chasing pack regardless of enjoying the fewest occasions of any of the top-nine scoring gamers on the Tour.
Whereas some gamers battle with the bounce from beginner to skilled, Grant has thrived.
“My final yr as an beginner, each time I dropped out of the zone of having the ability to win, it was nearly prefer it wasn’t motivating anymore,” Grant stated.
“The sensation that I’m enjoying for cash now – that it’s my residing – rapidly, I really feel prefer it doesn’t matter [dropping out of the zone]. If I can simply make it birdie on the final I can nonetheless earn greater than if I didn’t.”
The one participant besting Grant in The Race to Costa del Sol is childhood buddy Maja Stark. Teammates on the Swedish nationwide staff from a younger age and college students on the identical highschool, the duo share a detailed bond.
“I at all times cheer her on and I hope she does the identical for me, which I do know she does,” Grant stated.
“It’s good to have somebody there that is aware of the scenario you’re in and to have the ability to speak to about issues that different individuals both can’t get their head round or just don’t perceive.”
Not that their friendship has stopped Grant from declaring the will to chase down and beat Stark to Spain as one among her key season targets.
With Johanna Gustavsson trailing Grant, an all-Swedish trio on the summit of The Race to Costa del Sol displays the Nordic nation’s dominance on the LET and the rising inventory of golf in Sweden, which has already produced a legend within the sport.
In Annika Sorenstam, Grant has a towering position mannequin. Sorenstam, co-founder of the Scandinavian Combined occasion, cast one of many biggest careers in girls’s golf historical past with 10 main triumphs and 72 LPGA match wins earlier than her skilled retirement in 2008.
Grant cites two causes for the current surge of high girls’s gamers within the nation: the funding and energy of the Swedish Golf Federation to develop the sport and, paradoxically, the cruel Nordic local weather.
As snowy circumstances lower quick {the golfing} season within the nation, Swedish gamers should work additional exhausting to maximise coaching, with Grant placing “misplaced” observe time into different actions that may help her recreation, such because the health club.
“We can not play 12 months a yr, which provides you a little bit of thick pores and skin,” she defined. “It’s zero levels, you simply should go on the market and hit wedges or no matter you might want to observe on.”
Together with her historic victory within the Scandinavian Combined occasion, it seems that angle is paying off – and serving to Grant in her mission to develop the game and act as a task mannequin, not only for girls however for all who play the sport.
“If that win may help anybody or simply give somebody a bit of additional motivation, I’m glad,” she stated.
