Cristie Kerr
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| Personal Information | |
|---|---|
| Birth | October 12, 1977 Miami, Florida U.S. |
| Height | 5 ft 3 in (1.60 m) |
| Nationality |  United States |
| Spouse | Erik Stevens |
| Residence | Scottsdale, Arizona, U.S. |
| College | none |
| Career | |
| Turned Pro | 1996 |
| Current tour | LPGA Tour (joined 1997) |
| Past tours | Futures Tour (1996) Players West Tour (1996) |
| Professional wins | 13 (LPGA Tour: 10, Futures Tour: 1, Other: 2) |
| Best Results in Major Championships | |
| Kraft Nabisco | T3: 2002, 2005 |
| LPGA Championship | T5: 1999, 2006 |
| U.S. Women's Open | Won 2007 |
| Women's British Open | T2: 2006 |
| Awards | |
| LPGA Komen Award | 2006 |
Cristie Kerr (born October 12, 1977 in Miami, Florida) is an American professional golfer who plays on the LPGA Tour.
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[edit] Amateur career
Kerr started playing golf at the age of eight. She had a very successful amateur career, won the 1994 Junior Orange Bowl International Golf Championship[1] and was the 1995 American Junior Golf Association Junior Player of the Year.[2] In 1996 she played in the Curtis Cup[3][4] and was the low amateur at the U.S. Women's Open. She graduated from Miami Sunset High School in West Kendall, Florida.[5]
[edit] Professional career
Kerr turned professional in 1996, playing on both the Futures Tour and Players West Tour. Her first professional victory came at the Ironwood FUTURES Classic in 1996. Late in 1996 she tied for sixth at the LPGA Final Qualifying Tournament to gain exempt status for 1997. Her LPGA career started fairly slowly. It took her three years to make the top fifty on the money list, but in 2002 she won for the first time on the LPGA at the Longs Drugs Challenge. By 2004 she was one of the leading players on the tour, with three tournament victories, and a fifth place finish on the money list. She won two tournaments in 2005 and moved up to third on the money list. She tied for second at the 2000 U.S. Women's Open matched by her performance in the 2006 Women's British Open. Her first win of 2006 came at the Franklin American Mortgage Championship where she posted a tournament-record score of 19 under par. To date, Kerr has ten wins on the LPGA Tour. In 2006, she was the only American to win more than one event on the LPGA Tour, winning three times (Americans won only seven of that year's 33 events). In 2007, she won the United States Women's Open Championship, her first major championship. She was also a member of the United States Solheim Cup team in 2002,[6] 2003[7] and 2005.[8]
The hallmarks of Kerr's game are putting; she finished in the top 5 on the LPGA Tour in putts/greens hit in 2005 and 2006 and iron play. She was 5th in greens-in-regulation in 2005. She is also among the longest hitters on the tour, though the other players have caught up to her in recent years. In 2003, Kerr switched to newer Callaway Golf equipment after playing with the same clubs for the previous seven years, and the move coincided with a sharp increase in wins and earnings on tour. In 2005, Kerr finished in the top 10 in half of the tournaments she entered, and ranked second in the LPGA in scoring average, trailing only Annika Sörenstam.
[edit] Breast cancer activist
Kerr is actively involved in fundraising for breast cancer research.
The LPGA and the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation awarded Kerr the 2006 LPGA Komen Award[9] due to her dedication to find a cure for breast cancer through the foundation that she founded called Birdies for Breast Cancer. Through her foundation, Kerr has raised $250,000 since 2004.
Kerr created the foundation in honor of her mother, Linda, who has been her inspiration. The foundation was created in 2003, the year that her mother Linda was diagnosed with breast cancer.[9]
Kerr is 5'3"/1.60 m and now weighs 125 pounds (8 stone 13 pounds; 57 kg), but in 1999 she weighed 175 pounds (79 kg), a weight that caused her to have back spasms. Her parents, who are divorced, are both diabetics, and her mother had a heart attack when Kerr was in ninth grade. After her weight had peaked, Kerr began exercising regularly and went on a diet. By 2002, she had lost 50 pounds.[10]
[edit] Off-course activities
Kerr's reported best friend on tour is Natalie Gulbis, and Donald Trump is an off-course friend.[citation needed] Kerr made an appearance on an episode of the third season of Trump's television series The Apprentice in 2005. In 2006, Kerr married Erik Stevens, who heads up a company that is developing a sports complex in Brooklyn, New York. Kerr and Stevens maintain residences in Scottsdale, Arizona and New York City. Her primary sponsor is Mutual of Omaha which donates money to her breast cancer research foundation as part of their sponsorship agreement. In addition to her Callaway clubs, Kerr uses Titleist Pro V1 brand golf balls, and is also sponsored by FootJoy and clothing manufacturer Lacoste.
[edit] Professional wins (13)
[edit] LPGA Tour (10)
- 2002 (1) Longs Drugs Challenge
- 2004 (3) LPGA Takefuji Classic, ShopRite LPGA Classic, State Farm Classic
- 2005 (2) Michelob ULTRA Open at Kingsmill, Wendy's Championship for Children
- 2006 (3) Franklin American Mortgage Championship, Canadian Women's Open, John Q. Hammons Hotel Classic
- 2007 (1) U.S. Women's Open
LPGA Majors are shown in bold.
[edit] Futures Tour (1)
- 1996 (1) Ironwood FUTURES Classic
[edit] Other wins (2)
- 2004 (1) Wendy's 3-Tour Challenge (with Grace Park and Juli Inkster, unofficial event)
- 2007 (1) Wendy's 3-Tour Challenge (with Natalie Gulbis and Morgan Pressel, unofficial event)
[edit] Results in LPGA majors
| Tournament | 1995 | 1996 | 1997 | 1998 | 1999 | 2000 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kraft Nabisco Championship | DNP | CUT | DNP | DNP | DNP | T35 |
| LPGA Championship | DNP | DNP | CUT | CUT | T5LA | WD |
| U.S. Women's Open | CUT | T36LA | DNP | 60 | CUT | T2 |
| du Maurier Classic | DNP | DNP | CUT | T54 | T17 | CUT |
| Tournament | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kraft Nabisco Championship | T66 | T3 | T11 | T5 | T3 | T35 | T20 | T21 |
| LPGA Championship | CUT | T41 | T34 | T17 | T33 | T5 | T18 | T10 |
| U.S. Women's Open | T4 | T32 | T13 | T27 | T10 | T28 | 1 | |
| Women's British Open | CUT | T29 | T14 | T11 | T5 | T2 | T33 |
DNP = did not play
CUT = missed the half-way cut
LA = Low Amateur
WD = withdrew
"T" = tied
Green background for a win. Yellow background for a top-10 finish.
[edit] Notes and references
- ^ Past Champions. Junior Orange Bowl. Retrieved on 2007-04-30.
- ^ All-Time Rolex Junior Players of the Year. American Junior Golf Association. Retrieved on 2007-04-04.
- ^ Previous Curtis Cup Matches 1932-2002. USGA. Retrieved on 2007-03-23.
- ^ 1996 Curtis Cup Match. USGA. Retrieved on 2007-03-23.
- ^ Women's intuition: Kerr grabs first major.
- ^ A Glimpse at the U.S. Solheim Cup Team. The Golf Channel (2002-09-16). Retrieved on 2007-04-28.
- ^ Sheehan Announces Selections. The Golf Channel (2003-08-25). Retrieved on 2007-04-28.
- ^ Bethan Cutler (2005-08-28). Lopez announces 2005 U.S. Solheim Cup Team. LET (Ladies European Tour). Retrieved on 2007-04-28.
- ^ a b Kerr receives the 2006 LPGA Komen Award for her breast cancer efforts. Professional Golf Association (2006-11-21). Retrieved on 2007-04-28.
- ^ Ron Sirak (2005-05-20). "The Winning Edge". GolfWorld Magazine. Retrieved on 2007-04-28.
[edit] External links
- Official site
- Profile on the LPGA Tour's official site
- Cristie Kerr bio
- Kerr wants 2nd win at Kingsmill - to make up for the one she nearly had 3 years ago The Virginian-Pilot, May 7, 2006
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