WATCHING Alexandra Keighley drive from the 17th hole in the first round of the Weetabix Women’s British Open at Royal Lytham & St Annes presented one of those sublime mental pictures that stay with you for a long time.
Keighley, one of only three amateurs in the field, is an elf-like figure. At 4ft 11in, she is six inches shorter than Ian Woosnam. She was the second to drive on the penultimate hole and, for a few moments, she stood on one side of the tee staring down the fairway and deep in conversation with her caddie as to the line she should take for this difficult shot. It was amusing to those standing on the other side of the tee from her because Keighley was so small her body was completely obscured by her golf bag. All you could see of her was her head, and that appeared to be protruding from her bag.
What Keighley did then, however, more than made up for those few moments of fun afforded to those who wanted to indulge in heightism.
Keighley, 22, more than punched her weight with her play, a reminder that she is the Yorkshire county champion — and she was in 2001 as well — and that she was an England international last year. She thwacked a drive down the left of the 17th fairway and cracked her second into the rising wind to within ten feet of the flagstick. Then she holed the putt.
Keighley’s second was played not far from where Bobby Jones hit his famous stroke on the 71st hole of the 1926 Open, the one that is credited with him winning that event. Despite the loft of the five-wood with which Keighley hit it, the ball bored through the wind, never moving from its target. It was a reminder of the way in which good players can keep the ball down when they want to — even when using clubs that are designed to get the ball into the air.
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They are proud of the Keighleys at the Lightcliffe golf club, a nine-hole golf course with seven bunkers, near Halifax. As many as 20 of its 300 members had come to Lancashire to support Alex, their best player and most famous golfer, including Sally Keighley, Alex’s mother, who is the club’s stewardess.
The merit of Keighley’s 70, three shots off the lead, was that it was done after the wind had turned and freshened so that it blew the sound of those commuter trains that rattle along by the side of the outward nine holes back over the course instead of away from it.
Wendy Ward, an American of considerable promise, started just before seven o’clock and went round in 67 and Karrie Webb, Annika Sorenstam’s nearest challenger to her title as the best woman golfer in the world, equalled that score, having hit her opening tee shot 45 minutes later.
Keighley, who began at 10.52, did not have the lowest round of the day and Karen Stupples beat her to the title of lowest Briton, but Keighley’s was probably the round of the day. It will be interesting to see how well she copes with matters in today’s second round. Will she still have that enviable briskness in her swing, a no-nonsense approach to the game that characterised her play yesterday?
Sorenstam made a decent start to her attempt to win the only major championship that has eluded her. A 68 leaves her one stroke behind Ward and Webb, four strokes better than Becky Morgan, one playing partner, and six strokes better than another, Julie Inkster, last week’s winner of the Evian Masters.
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Sorenstam went to the turn in a ho-hum 34, one under par, but really got to grips with her homeward half. Though she dropped a precious stroke on the 15th, which was playing into the wind, she picked up four birdies.
It is said that the key to coping with the challenge presented by Lytham is keeping one’s head — and score — over the last five holes. Just as important is to stay out of the course’s 198 bunkers. Easier said than done. Not one of the leaders managed it yesterday.
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TELEVISION: Live: BBC Two: 12.55pm-5.15pm, shared with coverage from Glorious Goodwood