Global Golf Post - July 25, 2011

LEWINE MAIR
EVIAN-LES-BAINS, FRANCE | When con-
firmation came last Wednesday that the
Evian Masters would become the LPGA’s
fifth major as of 2013, there were those
who suspected that the Asian players
had to be a little miffed. True, the Evian is
one of the most impressive tournaments
of them all but, with the Koreans having
36 players in the world’s top 100 and the
Japanese 22, how come that the fifth ma-
jor did not have an Asian destination?

Since it would be all wrong were the Asians to be kept out of the picture for too much longer, should we expect that number to go up to six and then seven? Probably not. A more likely scenario – not that there was any indication of this from on high – would be for the LPGA to ship the LPGA championship out East.

In the meantime, it is impossible to
speak too highly of the Evian. Any tourna-
ment based in a little town and embraced
by its residents – St Andrews, Crans-sur-
of them – including making sweeping
changes to the course – if they could have
major status.

It is impossible to speak too highly of the Evian. Any tournament based in a little town and embraced by its residents ... is almost always going to work.

Sierre, Pinehurst and Nairn, home of next year’s Curtis Cup, are four more like it – is almost always going to work. You see the same people on the streets as on the fairways and, in Evian last week, there were handsome pink banners draped around greens and lampposts alike. The atmosphere was as good as it gets.

The discussions among Whan, Franck
Riboud, the Evian Masters’ chairman, and
Jacques Bungert, the tournament direc-
tor, had been going on for two years. The
Evian pair had told Whan that they were
prepared to do anything that was asked
Initially, his father had sponsored a
music festival in the town. Riboud Sr.
decided to switch to golf 20 years ago and
started out with a men’s pro-am. When
the men did not hit the mark, he swapped
them for the women – and the company
has stayed with them ever since.

Evian does its best by everyone, including caddies, who for a long time were treated downright badly at some of the women’s events on the European Tour. The Evian chairman remembers a week when he was caddying for France’s Sandrine Mendiburu in the UK. At the end of a hard day, he needed a drink and headed for the clubhouse. To his irritation, the officials took one look at this pillar of French society’s caddie-bib and sent him packing.

Since then, he has dreamed up something new for the caddies in Evian each year, a departure which kicked off with a football match in 1998. Would you believe that the caddies who walked on to the pitch that year found themselves playing against a side taking in Zinedine Zindane, a member of that year’s winning French World Cup side.

Past winners of the Evian will be the only losers as run-of-the-mill-becomes major in that they cannot suddenly boast of having a major in their locker. In which connection, Laura Davies will feel it more than most. Apart from having won two Evians too soon, she also captured the British before that championship was promoted.