EVANS, Ga. — Out of the 72-player field that was set for the 2026 Augusta National Women’s Amateur, 35 of them were making their first start at the prestigious event. Many of them spent years watching the tournament after its inaugural run back in 2019, hoping for the opportunity to earn a trip to Augusta.
With Round 2 in the books, players got to experience the aura of the Champions Retreat course and hospitality of Augusta National Golf Club in full effect. Whether players made the cut or not, the ANWA lived up to much of their expectations.
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“I think it’s been what I imagined, and much more,” Wake Forest sophomore Chloe Kovelesky said. “It is incredible with everything they do, but this has just been so fun and enjoyable.
In an event like the ANWA, where it’s a collection of the top ranked women amateur golfers in the world, the majority of them have been exposed to well-known courses in the past. Players like Texas A&M sophomore Vanessa Borovilos, though, was in awe of just how different this venue is from any other.
“I know Augusta and Champions Retreat is built for tournaments like this, but you come here and you start playing the course, start putting the greens, and it’s just so pure,” Borovilos said. “You never know when you’re going to get to play another course like this.”
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Despite Champions Retreat’s beautiful aesthetic, it certainly can be unforgiving. Just ask 16-year-old Canadian Aphrodite Deng, who started with a bogey out of the gate and had to put up a stellar second round to make the cut.
The challenge is also part of the allure when it comes to these top-tier golfers. Being able to conquer the course isn’t easy, and failure is more likely than success. But after the first two rounds, first timers have been able to learn from their failures and parlay that into the immediate future as well as down the line.
“It’s not how good your good shots are, it’s how bad your bad shots are,” Borovilos said after finishing the second round T-6. “We’ve tried to limit those on the course because you can screw yourself over a couple times here if you miss it in the wrong spot.
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Megan Propeck, a graduate student at Florida, was one of the first-timers who didn’t make the cut this go around. While her amateur career will end after her final semester with the Gators, playing in this event has given her confidence that she’s still good enough to hang around with future professionals as she plans to turn pro soon.
In between rounds, a little girl ran up to Propeck. She and her family were all Gator fans. She handed her a drawing that said “good luck” on it. That interaction, plus the many patrons that were in attendance of the ANWA, gave the graduate student hope for the future of her sport.
“It’s awesome to see so many people supporting women’s golf,” Propeck said. “You don’t really see that much in our college tournaments.”
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The different aspects of the tournament outside of golf also brought a different element for many first-time starters. Barbados-native Emily Odwin had to ask her SMU teammate Mackenzie Lee what she should wear for some of the events held for the players throughout the tournament.
Getting interviewed by the media and being in the spotlight, Odwin mentioned, was also something that she wasn’t expecting coming into the tournament. In fact, for some, golf wasn’t even the hardest thing they had to do this week.
“It freaks me out,” Vanderbilt junior Ava Merrill said on dealing with the media. “I’m standing over a golf ball, and I can just think about how much easier it is to hit a golf ball than talk to the media.”
This article originally appeared on Augusta Chronicle: First-timer thoughts at the 2026 Augusta National Women’s Amateur