Maja Stark and Linn Grant return to the LET this week to make their debuts in The Amundi Evian Championship.
The Swedish Rookies, ranked first and second on the Race to Costa del Sol respectively, both have their eyes on the prize – namely the $1 million USDwinner’s cheque, as the purse has increased by $2 million USD to $6.5 million USD this year – but even more importantly, a prize that cannot be bought: Major champion status.
Stark and Grant are both looking to earn their first Major victory at The Amundi Evian Championship, which would be worth 675 official points on the Race to Costa del Sol Rankings. There are only 292 points separating the pair heading into the Championship. Fellow Swede Johanna Gustavsson also has a mathematical chance of leapfrogging Stark with a win.
All three Swedes benefited from playing in the Jabra Ladies Open presented by Bitstamp at Evian Resort Golf Club in late May, on the same golf course, albeit on a different set-up.
Stark, who has won the Women’s New South Wales Open and the Amundi German Masters so far this year, said: “I’m excited about playing in a tournament again. I haven’t really thought about it as a different competition to any of the other LET events. It’s a bigger, stronger field, but I’ve played at the course before.
“I’ve had a good season and I’m always expecting the best from myself, hopefully being up there in contention and hoping that it’s enough, this week. I’m always aiming for the win. I haven’t been training a bunch at home on this week off, I just felt like I needed the time off to re-set my brain a bit. I’ve only practised when I felt like it and I think it’s been good for me.
“The shots are there and I know what to work on and what happens when I’m not hitting the ball very well. Last week was more about sustaining what I have and not practising anything new.
“The Jabra Ladies Open went well but I think the course is slightly different. It feels a bit longer than it was at the Jabra and the greens are softer now than they were then. The rough is a bit longer but for sure it’s nice to have played it before because it’s a very tricky course, both strategically and just knowing where to hit around the greens. In some places, you can end up with an almost impossible shot if you’re not careful, so it’s really good to have been here before and to have started to figure the course out and it’s nice that it was pretty recent that we played here.”
Grant, who has won the Joburg Ladies Open, the Mithra Belgian Ladies Open and the Volvo Car Scandinavian Mixed, where she became the first female winner on the DP World Tour in the co-sanctioned event with the LET, is also aiming high.
Grant said: “I’m really looking forward to this week and the course looks amazing. I’m super excited about going to test my game against the very best.
“I’ve only played in the British and US Opens, so it will be my first time at The Evian, which I am very excited about.
“I do have high expectations. I’ve played alright in the majors before and I like the major feeling. Courses are longer and tougher. The greens are faster so you need to have more patience with your game and I think that suits me, so I pretty much expect to play well.
“I’ve just been home. I took some days off in the beginning and then I’ve been working with my coach to try to find a good place heading into six weeks in a row.
“I think playing in the Jabra Ladies Open has been helpful, looking at the course now over the past two days. I remember thinking that it was very tricky when I came off the course on the last day of the Jabra Ladies Open and I still think it’s very tricky. It’s still nice to have some feel for the course before playing in one of the biggest events of the year. I’m excited; it’s a very pretty course and I think it will be good.”
Last year, in 2021, Amundi became the new title sponsor and there were some incredible scores on the Champions Course. Up until Friday, past champion Hyo-Joo Kim held the course record thanks to her incredible 61 (-10) during the first round of the 2014 tournament. That was equalled twice in 2021, firstly by Jeongeun Lee6 of South Korea, with a bogey free 61 in the second round on Friday morning and then by Leona Maguire of Ireland, who shot 10 birdies and eight pars on the Sunday.
The 2019 US Women’s Open champion, Lee6, led by seven strokes heading into the last round but a seven-under-par 64 from Australian Minjee Lee saw her enter a play-off and Lee then claimed her first Major in her eighth season as a professional.
As well as Lee, the current world no.2, this year’s field of 132 players includes past champions Jin-Young Ko (2019) (the Rolex Women’s World Golf Rankings number one); Angela Stanford (2018), Anna Nordqvist (2017), In Gee Chun (2016), Lydia Ko (2015) and Hyo Joo Kim (2014), as well as Rolex Rankings number three and five, Nelly Korda and Atthaya Thitikul, the winner of last year’s Race to Costa del Sol, respectively. View the full entry list here.
