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<\/a><\/p>\nImagine the faces of those trailblazers if they were to encounter the modern version of the championship. True, the money on offer would delight them, but surely the stature of the tournament, and the treatment of the players, would utterly bewilder them.<\/p>\n
At the media day to launch this year\u2019s championship, the R&A highlighted that the player experience is one of its key tenets (the others being quality venues and growth of in-person, digital and broadcast audience).<\/p>\n
Those golfers of 1976 would have been happy with a locker room and a bar that offered soup and sandwiches given that most of their golf was played under all manner of petty restrictions and obscure barriers.<\/p>\n
They\u2019d be shocked by the dedicated, free-standing player clubhouse of this summer, with a catering team preparing performance nutrition and cuisine from around the world to reflect the field\u2019s diversity.<\/p>\n
They\u2019d be surprised by a performance and recovery area, plus the specialised women\u2019s and mental-health services.<\/p>\n
They\u2019d be tickled by the presence of an enhanced sauna, but surely downright astounded by not one but two cold plunge pools.<\/p>\n
That said, the modern-day players are very appreciative of the facilities available to them.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re very proud to have won the LPGA\u2019s Gold Driver Award for the best player experience for two consecutive years.\u201d \u2013 Mark Darbon<\/p>\n
Charley Hull has described the off-course experience at the championship as \u201cthe best on the LPGA Tour schedule\u201d and her peers have backed her up.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re very proud to have won the LPGA\u2019s Gold Driver Award for the best player experience for two consecutive years,\u201d R&A CEO Mark Darbon said at Royal Lytham. \u201cWe pride ourselves on offering all of the players present at our championship the best experience possible and we will continue to make strides in this area into the future.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt reflects a clear ambition to continue to build the AIG Women\u2019s Open as one of the leading women\u2019s sporting events in the world. As we celebrate 50 years, we\u2019re proud of what\u2019s been achieved but even more excited about what\u2019s to come.\u201d<\/p>\n
As complete as the transformation of the championship has been since 1976, the real change has come more recently. Gaining major championship status in 2001 was one leap. The sponsorship of Ricoh from 2007 to 2018 was another, since it promoted the championship among Asian audiences.<\/p>\n
The R&A taking over the event\u2019s organisation in 2017 was another key step and AIG has now tripled the prize money over its seven-year sponsorship.<\/p>\n
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Charley Hull has described the off-course experience at the AIG Women\u2019s Open as \u201cthe best on the LPGA Tour schedule.\u201d Alex Slitz, Getty Images<\/p>\n
After admitting that the championship is not making a profit, Darbon noted that it could straightforwardly be put in the black, but at the expense of many aims and objectives.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf profitability was our No. 1 ambition for this event, we could achieve that result,\u201d he said. \u201cBut it is not a principal target for us.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe treat the Women\u2019s Open as an investment into the game. We think it\u2019s incredibly important to provide a platform for the best athletes to perform, and we believe that that translates into inspiring and exciting millions of young people to pick up a club all around the world.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur focus is audience growth. In sport, if you grow the audience, the commercial side will take care of itself. So our focus is telling stories alongside our partners to grow and elevate the women\u2019s game more broadly. It is about getting more eyeballs on this wonderful championship.\u201d<\/p>\n
In addition to news of this year\u2019s championship there was also the opportunity to learn of future venues. Royal St George\u2019s, in Sandwich, had already been confirmed as the 2027 host, but Sunningdale was announced as the 2028 venue.<\/p>\n
More intriguingly, Darbon hinted at a possible venture across the Irish Sea. \u201cWe\u2019re also looking at Portmarnock,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re in dialogue with the Irish government and with the club. There\u2019s a great opportunity to stage an AIG Women\u2019s Open in Ireland at some point.\u201d<\/p>\n
This summer there will be high hopes for the home contingent.<\/p>\n
Since the championship gained major status in 2001 only three Brits have lifted the trophy and two of them \u2013 Catriona Matthew in 2009 and Georgia Hall in 2018 \u2013 triumphed at Royal Lytham & St Annes.<\/p>\n
Leading this year\u2019s challenge will be Hull (runner-up in the event twice in the last three years), Lottie Woad (T8 last year at Royal Porthcawl) and Mimi Rhodes (who made a hole-in-one last year on her way to a top-20 finish).<\/p>\n
They will all be presented with a new task since the course\u2019s par-5 11th hole has been rebuilt and is something of a triumph.<\/p>\n
What was previously a rather bland and flat dogleg is now a fine adventure through the bunker-dotted dunes that were previously dormant on the inside of the dogleg.<\/p>\n
The green remains, but the journey to it is greatly enhanced and the land where the old fairway sat is now part of a new practice ground.<\/p>\n
\u00a9 2026 Global Golf Post LLC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Morgan Harlow, R&A via Getty Images LYTHAM ST ANNES, ENGLAND | On Tuesday, it was revealed that the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":563084,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[18302,5904,38510,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-563083","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-aig-womens-open","tag-golf","tag-ra","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/563083","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=563083"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/563083\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/563084"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=563083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=563083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=563083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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Morgan Harlow, R&A via Getty Images<\/p>\n