Sweet-swinging Minjee happy to do own thing as little bro does his

While her brother navigates 18 holes in the sort of squiggly lines favoured by Seve Ballesteros, Minjee Lee’s lines resemble a stern conversation. Straight to the point.

Minjee Lee plays gets her first look at The Australian Golf Course on Tuesday Picture: Getty Images

Minjee Lee hits The Lakes at 7am. Before Sydney receives a tender sprinkling of springtime showers. She plays her golf like we do in our dreams. Fairways and greens, fairways and greens. Only occasional in-betweens. A putt or two and that’ll do. She’s as reliable as the ticking of the clubhouse clock.

“I actually feel quite relaxed this week,” she says before joining brother Min Woo Lee in their attempt to go wham, bam, sibling slam at the Australian Open. “I thought I’d feel a bit more pressure like I usually feel coming to an Aussie Open. I’m not sure what it is. It might be that I don’t know the golf courses that well. I’ve never been here. It just kind of feels like I’m coming into this new week and getting to know the golf courses and playing two really great tracks that I haven’t been to before … Aussie Open’s always a tough trophy to win … added pressure … especially in front of a home crowd and in Australia. We’ll see how we go.”

Excellence and humility command respect. Professionally, personally. Lee’s conquered a couple of majors but has zero interest in becoming a celebrity or a household name, or wearing a chef’s hat, and she doesn’t want a bar of that showboating nincompoop Dr Chipinski. She’s plays a different game, a different tune, just quietly going about her career and her life and bravo for that. While the bright-eyed and brilliantly entertaining Min Woo navigates 18 holes in the sort of squiggly lines favoured by Seve Ballesteros, teetering left and right as if a ship on stormy seas, Minjee’s lines resemble a stern conversation. Straight to the point.

Fairways and greens, fairways and greens. She could start and finish the year using the same ball. You get less precision on a com­puter game. The efficient and uncomplicated swing finishes with a follow-through so peaceful and picturesque you might like to hang a Christmas bauble from it. Nine holes at The Lakes and then she zips over to the Open’s main course, culinary pun intended, The Australian, for another nine.

The textbook technique brings to mind Josh Hazlewood’s bowling action in that not a lot can go wrong … even when it’s going wrong. “Anything she does, she only does really well,” Min Woo says. “Sometimes people say, ‘Does it suck?’ I don’t think it sucks. I would rather her do really well than bad. It’s motivating for me to play as good as her. She does it so easy and I have to bust my butt to win a tournament.”

Min Woo, as we discovered at Royal Queensland, is a walking, talking party hole. A night on the town when you’ve really decided to tie one on. Minjee is more a quiet cuppa with one of your best and most trusted mates. You’ll buckle up to watch Min Woo at the Australian Open. You’re more likely settle in for Minjee as if opening the pages of a favourite novel. Min Woo does it his way, Minjee does it hers. Both hold appeal. It’s entirely possible to like country AND western. Polite applause seems to suit Minjee’s game and personality but hopefully at least one patron with a sense of humour shouts, “Let that young lady cook!”

Here’s a surprising fact ahead of Thursday’s start to the busiest golf tournament in the world, the simultaneous men’s and women’s national Opens. No Australian woman has triumphed since Karrie Webb at Melbourne’s Victoria Club in 2014. World No.5 Minjee’s every chance of ending the drought by the time we pull up stumps at The Australian on Sunday afternoon. See how
they go.

Min Woo says it’d be “pretty crazy” if they go wham, bam, slam. He says the only pettiness in their rivalry comes from him. They’re in back-to-back groups from 7.05am on Thursday at The Lakes. Min Woo will be joined by Cam Smith. To have a likeable Australian brother and sister duo win the Australian Open on the same day at the same course – that’d be just love-Lee.

“I actually haven’t even seen him,” she says. “I want to congratulate him (on winning the Australian PGA Championship). I don’t know, maybe the rivalry is a little bit more for Min Woo because he’s super-competitive. I’m competitive. I don’t outwardly say it to him but inside I want to do better. A little bit better. We haven’t really spoken too much over the past couple of months. He’s been really busy travelling and I’ve been busy wrapping up the LPGA season. Maybe just seeing him win gives me a little extra motivation. Of course, I want him to do well every single week. I’ll do my very best.”

Min Woo’s wooing the world of social media. He’s enjoying the whole “let that young man cook” thing so much he may dip a little tomato sauce on his ball on the first tee. Asked what she thinks of little brother spending so much time on his phone, the senior sibling Lee and most accomplished player in the family says: “I think it’s cool. He put it out there himself and people just kind of got on the bandwagon a bit. A lot now. I think he really thrives off it and really enjoys interacting with the crowd and people kind of follow that kind of energy. He’s got great energy. I don’t really have an opinion. He’s doing it, he likes it and he’s doing it for himself. I’ll encourage it.”