Sorenstam, Webb: Unnatural Rivals

Now it can be told. There is no rivalry on the LPGA Tour after all. How can there be a rivalry when the two best female golfers on the planet are so, well, different?

Here’s how this thing goes. Annika Sorenstam is scared of flying and Karrie Webb jumps out of airplanes (with a parachute, of course). Sorenstam hates takeoffs and Webb loves landings.

Webb drives drag racers and stock cars in celebrity events and Sorenstam wonders if she’s going to get hit driving to her hotel.

Webb can’t wait to try bungee-jumping and Sorenstam can’t wait until she turns on her laptop to figure her greens-in-regulation percentage.

Webb craves the excitement, the high-voltage charge she gets from trying something that could melt those windshield-looking shades she wears.

Sorenstam doesn’t.

“I don’t need the adrenaline,” she said. “I’m happy waking up.”

And so it goes in LPGA land, where rivalries are made and not born, where a near-sighted Swede and a thrill-seeking Aussie are thrown together on the fairway to match golf skills, personalities and approaches to life.

It’s looking very much as though it’s up to Sorenstam and Webb to carry the women’s pro game into the next century. The reason it seems this way is because that is the story line the LPGA would like.

Sure, the LPGA has never been deeper in good players, but there has to be some conflict. There needs to be rivals.

You can dig into sports for examples. McEnroe had Borg. Dempsey had Tunney. Palmer had Nicklaus.

And beginning today at Oakmont Country Club in Glendale, the Los Angeles Women’s Championship has Sorenstam and Webb and the best little rivalry in golf.

In 1997, no one played the LPGA Tour any better than Sorenstam and Webb, although Kelly Robbins threw her ponytail into the ring.

If nothing else, Sorenstam and Webb spent the year playing a different little game of tag.

Sorenstam was player of the year. Webb was runner-up. Webb won the Vare Trophy. Sorenstam was runner-up. Sorenstam won the money title. Webb was runner-up. Webb had more top-10 finishes. Sorenstam putted better. Webb had more birdies. Sorenstam won six times to give her 12 victories in her career. Webb got three of her six victories last year.

That’s probably what you would call a rivalry, all right, and where it came from, well, who cares? It’s certainly all right with Sorenstam.

“I think it’s great p.r.,” she said. “Especially if both of us are playing well. . . . I know one thing, it’s going to keep me on my toes.

“Last year, I sort of lost my focus at times. ‘What did she shoot? Where is she?’ At the end of the year, it was Karrie-Me, Karrie-Me. I don’t want to let that happen this year. I think in a way, it gets me going. It’s real hard, though, just block it out once in a while.”

Sorenstam’s off-season amounted to one, long skiing vacation at Tahoe, not to mention getting braces. She threw her clubs in the garage and didn’t touch them for five weeks, then started practicing. She broke out some new Callaway irons and in no time was knocking shots so close to the hole it looked like a golf ball convention.

Webb’s time off lasted eight weeks and included her second sky-diving experience, in tandem with a partner. Add to that the auto racing and the white-water rafting and you might be seeing an actual, real-life daredevil in fire-retardant spikes, but Webb said she isn’t one.

“A lot of people think those things I do are not too wise for my golf career,” Webb said. “But you only live once. And I don’t think I do anything that crazy.”

No, the crazy thing is that she just can’t shake the comparisons with Sorenstam. They don’t play like each other at all. For instance, Webb bombs the ball off the tee. Sorenstam is so precise, she could cut diamonds.

While Webb is very close to Robbins, she’s friendly with Sorenstam, but not at all close. Webb knows she’s going to be linked with Sorenstam for the foreseeable future, even if she isn’t sure she will like it all that much.

“I understand it, but I’m just so sick of that sort of pressure,” Webb said. “At the same time, if I weren’t playing well, I wouldn’t be in this position, so that’s the way it is.”

Meanwhile, there are no clouds to cover Sorenstam’s sunny disposition. She has discovered she plays better when she’s relaxed, so her plan is to downplay her results. Sorenstam says she has accomplished everything she wants, which allows her to play golf and forget everything else.

“The results are there, but results aren’t everything,” Sorenstam said. “What I think about is ‘How can I get better results, but feel great?’ The way I look at it, the goal is over there, and you can follow many paths to get there.”

One path neither Webb nor Sorenstam followed last year led to victory in a major championship, although Sorenstam, 27, has won two U.S. Open titles.

Webb, 23, hasn’t broken through yet, but she will, mainly because Sorenstam is two ahead of her already. As for this year, Webb said she would be “over the moon” to have the results she had last year.

And she probably would be packing a parachute.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

L.A. WOMEN’S CHAMPIONSHIP

WHEN: Today through Sunday

WHERE: Oakmont Country Club (6,276 yards, par 72), Glendale.

PURSE: $650,000

WINNER’S SHARE: $97,5000.

TV: None.