5 years on, the course opens its doorways for the fifth and remaining main of the ladies’s season, a lot to the delight of the individuals.
It is going to be a particular type of pleasure for Scottish golfer Catriona Matthew who, past having the chance to expertise a serious only a quick drive from dwelling, will go down in historical past as the primary girl to tee off at Muirfield in a Ladies’s Open.
“It is an enormous honor if you’re requested to do one thing like that,” Matthew, Open champion at Royal Lytham in 2009, informed reporters Tuesday.
“I feel it may be a terrific expertise … all of the gamers may have watched the lads play right here over time and I feel they’re delighted to have that chance to return right here and play their very own Open.
“That simply elevates this championship, and we at the moment are going to programs that individuals are used to seeing The Open and the majors on. I feel it is good for us.”
The 52-year-old admitted she was “disenchanted” with the preliminary vote to take care of male-only membership, however believes the reversal confirmed progress is being made.
“You simply should look ahead quite than look backwards,” Matthews added. “Golf, beginning in Scotland, we had much more traditions maybe, that we’re simply step by step shifting with the occasions.
“Hopefully any ladies or boys who’re {golfing}, they will see each the lads and the ladies enjoying the identical golf programs, which is nice.”
Lioness classes
Anna Nordqvist arrives in East Lothian because the defending Open champion, having clinched a one-stroke victory at Carnoustie final 12 months. Together with her first main look coming as an newbie on the occasion in 2007, the triumph consolidated a “particular” connection between the three-time major-winning Swede and the Open.
“I’ve heard rather a lot about Muirfield,” Nordqvist mentioned. “I do know the fellows have performed right here over time, so I feel it is a tremendous alternative for us to have Muirfield added to our Open rotation.
“Coming in by means of the gate, (I) noticed my image — it is the primary image you see — clearly it nonetheless feels fairly surreal to have my identify on the trophy,” she added.
Regardless of the ache of seeing Sweden routed 4-0 within the semi-final by the eventual champions, Nordqvist sees parallels within the elevated protection of girls’s soccer and golf.
“It is simply thrilling to see that I feel girls’s sport (all) over the world is getting extra consideration,” she mentioned.
“It was fairly a giant occasion, the best way they had been internet hosting it and the TV occasions, I feel that is crucial. Our tee occasions are getting higher, too. Plenty of occasions, we tee off early as a result of (of) … the fellows’ schedule.”
‘Recharged’
Whereas Nordqvist tees off as reigning champion, Brooke Henderson begins as arguably the shape participant.
After withdrawing from the Scottish Open, received by Japan’s Ayaka Furue on Sunday, Henderson is “recharged” and raring to go.
“To be enjoying this 12 months, it actually means rather a lot to all of us,” she mentioned. “It is simply proof that the ladies’s recreation is continuous to develop — the purse sizes are rising, we’re on community TV extra, and we’re enjoying these higher venues.
“It is only a actually enjoyable time to be part of girls’s golf, as a result of it’s rising a lot and we really feel like we’re making a distinction for future generations.”
“I used to be extraordinarily excited to return out and play this occasion this 12 months,” she mentioned.
“I knew the historical past, and the truth that we had been going to be the primary feminine match out right here, too, was fairly superb.
“So I used to be simply extra excited to truly be out right here and to get to play this golf course and soak all of it up, in addition to the historical past of this place.”
Catriona Matthew is ready to tee off first in her group alongside Sophia Schubert and Louise Duncan at 6:30 a.m. native time (01:30 a.m. ET) on Thursday.
