Top-six finish for Leona as hard work starts to pay off

'In fairness, she is happy now, she has put in a lot of work on her short game as well.'

Paul Fitzpatrick

Leona Maguire’s bright start to the LPGA tour season continued at the weekend as she finished in a tie for sixth place at the Drive On Championship in Florida.

The Ballyconnell star hovered around the top 10 throughout the event and finished strongly on Sunday with a 70 to finish on five-under after a round which included six birdies including three in a row on five, six and seven.

Coming off the back of a 16th-place finish at the Gainsbridge Championship, Maguire is in fine form as she looks to kick on from a promising rookie season last year.

The 26-year-old Cavan woman is currently based at Lake Nona in Florida.

“She would like to get home to be able to see Shane (O’Grady, her coach), and work on strength and conditioning with her coach at home bhut she just has to keep herself based over there. It’s about lessening the chances of coming into contact with Covid really,” Leona’s father Declan told The Anglo-Celt on Monday.

“Then the weather is a factor too. To be playing at that level, you sort of have to be practising in the warm climate too. Last year when she did go back after lockdown she had to acclimatise to the weather because it was very warm, 30-plus degrees.

“She is basing herself there mostly for those reasons, the facilities are there, less travel and less chance of coming into contact with Covid. They are very strict on the tour, they are tested three or four times a week and if a player of caddy tests positive, they are out of action straight away so you’re minding yourself a lot of the time.”

Leona was last home in Cavan in December. She recognised a need to add more distance to her game and has been working on doing just that – and it is clearly paying off already.

“When she came home at Christmas time, she said that there are certain players hitting the ball so much further,” explained Declan.

“It’s tournament golf and the pins are tucked away and you’d much prefer to be going in with shorter clubs; instead of going in with an eight or nine iron, she was going in with a five or six-iron or maybe a hybrid.

“On the firm greens over there, it’s not easy to get the ball stopped. We looked at the whole strength and conditioning programme and she did a lot of work over Christmas in fairness to her, adding speed.

“Yesterday, she was playing with Nelly Korda and what pleased her most was on the 18th, she out-drove Nelly. That nearly pleased her more than coming sixth.”

Last year, Leona was the number one-ranked putter on tour and if she can continue to increase her length off the tee, more top 10s seem inevitable for the Cavan woman.

“She has done a lot of work with Shane on her putting but she probably feels herself she still could hole more but he will hopefully get a week where everything just clicks in and they all start dropping.

“She was a little bit frustrated last week, she felt she could have finished top five because she had so many chances that lipped out and brushed past the hole, on another day she’d have been really competing.

“In fairness, she is happy now, she has put in a lot of work on her short game as well.

“Her short game has traditionally always been good, her long game is consistent but the thing with golf now is that you’ve got to hit it far to compete. The ladies courses in tournaments over there are probably longer than men would be playing amateur events here.

“They’re right at their limit. If you’re going into a green with a hybrid as opposed to a wedge or a nine-iron, your chances of getting it close are limited, especially when you’re playing tournament golf and they put the pins away in very difficult positions. You’ve got to be going in with shorter clubs so you can get the height on the ball and can get it to stop because the greens are usually fairly firm.

“Leona was saying that even this week, the grass around the green was quite difficult and you had to make sure that you kept the ball on the green because if you went off into the grass that was off the green, you had to hit it firm there and you couldn’t control where it stopped, there was no check on the ball. It was about managing the course there at the weekend.

“That would be a strong point of hers, she’d recognise that straight away when she’d go to practise on the course.

“Overall, she was pleased because the world number one didn’t make the cut, Lexi Thompson, Lydia Ko, Charley Hull, they all finished well down below her. She has got herself off to a great start.”

Leona will have a fortnight’s break and then one tournament before the first Major of the season.

“She has two weeks off now and then she goes into the Kia Classic and then the week after that is the first Major, the A&A in California. She did well in that last year so she will be hoping this year with the added little bit of length that she might be able to compete even better.

“The A&A is the equivalent of the Masters. Then you’ll have the US Open, the PGA and the British Open.

“She knows now, especially after these two events, that she can compete with them. Annika Sorenstam is a member in Lake Nona and Lydia Ko is a member there as well so she has played with them. Regular practice with them will only improve her game, it’s like Cavan playing in Division 1 in the football, the more you can play with the top teams and against them, you have to bring up your game.

“When you’re at home and practising on your own, it’s okay to a point but you have to sort of be competing with similar type golfers. Because people don’t realise the level of competition on the tour and every year there’s another 10 or 20 new players coming on tour that you didn’t hear about last year.”