Australian golf star Sarah Kemp’s comeback from a broken leg in freak golf cart accident
Australia’s LPGA Tour veteran Sarah Kemp reveals the nightmare doubts about her career after a horror injury suffered in a freak golf cart incident last year.
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Australia’s LPGA Tour veteran Sarah Kemp has opened up on the horrific leg injury which she briefly feared would end her career after a golf cart rammed into her while she tried to pick a club out of a bag.
Kemp, 39, is on the comeback trail after suffering a compound fracture in her right leg – including a broken tibia and fibula – when a playing partner accidentally drove an electric buggy into her during a social round in the United States.
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The impact sandwiched Kemp between two carts and forced her into emergency surgery, prematurely ending her LPGA Tour season last year, and requiring more than six months of rehabilitation as she prepares to return to the course.
“It was pretty traumatic,” Kemp said.
“At first, I was just in shock. I was supposed to be flying to Scotland the next day and playing the Scottish Open on the LPGA. It was just out of nowhere.
“I was just kind of standing there and all of a sudden I’m in the back of an ambulance in America. It was just so crazy. I think because of the shock, it wasn’t like, ‘oh, my life is about to change’.
“But after surgery for the first two or three weeks I could barely sleep. It was pretty intense pain. The first few weeks were difficult: I was shocked, depressed, wasn’t sleeping. I kind of thought, ‘is this going to be a career ending injury?’”
Kemp’s surgery involved doctors inserting a rod and five screws into her leg and she was bedridden for almost two months after the operation. She is likely to go under the knife again later this year to have the screws removed.
The injury couldn’t have come at a worse time: Kemp had been enjoying two of the best years of her career as she threatened to sneak inside the world’s top 100.
Having played a mini tour event in Florida earlier this month, Kemp will make her full return to professional golf as one of the headline acts at the Australian WPGA Championship at Sanctuary Cove on the Gold Coast next week.
“Once I got out of bed after a couple of months and went for an x-ray and (the doctor) said I could take off my boot, I started to cry,” Kemp said.
“It was the best thing ever. After two months, the mindset shifted to how lucky I was.
“When I get up in the morning, I look like I need crutches but once I warm it up (it’s OK). I’ve got to start a warm up routine a couple of hours before I get to the golf course now. It’s for the most part healed.
“I’m just grateful to be up and standing and playing golf again. I’ve got no idea what’s going to happen, I’m just glad to be playing.”
Kemp will make minor swing alterations with coach John Serhan to cater for her recovering leg and insists she only has minor pain when performing tasks such as picking the ball out of the cup.
Kemp will join Grace Kim as the star power at the WPGA Championship before the Australian Women’s Classic and NSW Open are played later in March. The WPGA Championship will be worth $600,000.
Kemp has a medical exemption to return to the LPGA Tour for seven starts later in the year, which she will use once she has several tournaments under her belt.
“It won’t last forever, but for the meantime having low expectations (is great),” she said.
“If I can keep walking 18 holes week after week and be able to play tournaments, it’s worth the little bit of discomfort.”
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Originally published as Australian golf star Sarah Kemp’s comeback from a broken leg in freak golf cart accident
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