Sweden’s Maja Stark, who leads the 2022 Race to Costa del Sol, is using a motto throughout the AIG Women’s Open at Muirfield.
What would Tiger do?
After 54 holes at the final Major of the year, the four-time LET winner is in a share of ninth place on four-under-par having shot rounds of 68, 71 and 70.
And the secret to her success so far this week has been to think about what Tiger Woods would do if he was playing Muirfield.
“I just think that I am Tiger because I feel like he wouldn’t back out of those shots,” said the 22-year-old. “He would hit it low and just really commit to it. So, I just think that I am Tiger when I’m hitting the low ones and then when I read putts, I say, okay, what would Tiger do? I just try to be like him.
“It means playing aggressively and being fearless. Not making the stupid mistakes, just taking a bogey if you have to because you’re going to make bogeys out there. You get the 400m par-4s into the wind, and it’s very difficult not to make a bogey. The mindset is playing aggressively and thinking that I can always win it.”
It was a steady round for Stark on day three at Muirfield with three birdies and two bogeys on her scorecard.
But it was the ball flight throughout that intrigued the Swedish star the most as she battled with the wind on a day where gusts reached up to 35mph.
She added: “It was very windy, but pretty steady. I made a couple mistakes with judging the wind in the end, now that it was so windy, and I struggled a bit on the long putts which wasn’t great because I had a lot of them.
“I managed to save some pars and make a few important putts on the back nine, so that was fun. It was challenging and very interesting. I was just hitting low shots on almost every hole, you’re punching everything pretty much, and then you get that wrong wind, and the ball just balloons up into the air.
“It’s very interesting to see the ball flights. You think that you hit a good shot and then you end up 30 metres short, and you don’t understand how that happened.”
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