Australian Open: Karrie Webb knows time is kind to the young

Time is trying to squeeze Karrie Webb out of golf.

Golf star Karrie Webb is now in the veteran class. ‘A golf ball doesn’t know how old you are.’ Picture: Zak Simmonds.

Time is trying to squeeze Karrie Webb out of golf. With seven major championships, she has been Australia’s best golfer and in her grandeur the finest women’s player in the world.

But time wearies you with ­little pushes, nudges and grabs. It slows you down. Soon you are not what you were. Your knees are the ones that wobble at the mention of your name.

Time is kind to the young. Practice is a joy, putting can be done blindfolded, groundhog day sounds like a vets’ convention, the ball disappears over the horizon. Every day is a golf day.

Minjee Lee, 19, is Australia’s No 1 golfer. Not Webb and that just doesn’t seem right.

Webb is 41 years old now. Her inspiration to take up golf was Greg Norman. He is 61.

Webb is ranked 34 in the world but it has been more than a year since she last triumphed. In 2014 she won the Australian Open at the Victoria Club in Melbourne and the Founders Cup in Phoenix. She has won 41 times on the US Tour. Lee has one win. And that is mighty good.

This fall from prominence if not influence has been taken with dignity by Webb, who will tee off in the opening round of the 2016 edition of the Open at Adelaide’s Grange Golf Course today. Once she found the game gruellingly tough, criticism galling. But she has taken the hijacking of her youth gracefully and with humour. We worry about the young ones on the tour, clambering up and about the ladder. She doesn’t.

“A golf ball doesn’t know how old you are,” she said.

There’s ­always room to improve. She reflects on a short game that is better than ever. She understands it now and it no longer haunts her.

She wants to play in the Rio Olympics but is bemused that everybody thinks she is an automatic entry.

Well, she will be. Along with Lee. A medal though “would be the icing on what is already a very nice cake”. A golden oldie.

The world No 1 is Lydia Ko. Right now the New Zealander is 18, a year younger than Lee. She has 10 wins on the US Tour and a major, the Evian Championships.

Former Australian champion Jane Crafter says Ko has no weaknesses. Fair point. They threw an earthquake at her in Christchurch last week and she still won her third NZ Open in four years.

Ko’s repeated belief that she will retire at 30 brings a smile from Webb. “I said I would retire when I was 35. And I’m still going.”

And she will until the game no longer excites her, challenges her. It makes you think Ko has only played golf and is yet to live it. She sets herself a goal for the year and then re-evaluates.

“I think you know when you’re 18, 30 seems like it’s a long way away but from experience it comes around pretty quickly,” Webb said.

Webb is right. Ko thinks Webb is amazing because when you are 18 even 25 might be another planet.

“I think she’s still won a few events even two years ago she won the Founder’s Cup. It shows how great a player they are even to do it for so long a time and it feels like their peak is still up there. So Karrie’s a great player and I feel like she’s one of the players with the best touch, short-game wise,” Ko said.

“I’m always learning when I get to play alongside her. I think she’s definitely opened up more opportunities in Australia and you can see players like Minjee following in (her) footsteps.”

What Webb has done is ground breaking; what Lee has done is exceptional and what Ko has achieved unthinkable. Ko has just gained a permit-to-drive licence. She has a new Lexus with a jazzy name but is not driving in Australia. She is disinclined to drive in a world where people drive on the wrong side of the road.

“It’s a fast car,” Ko said yesterday. “I feel like I should be going 80 miles per hour but I’m only going 30 miles per hour, so I’m not doing the car much justice. But it’s been fun. I’ve always been interested in driving.

“ Everyone said it’s like a golf kart but they lied. It’s nothing like a golf kart. It’s fun and I’ve still got lots to learn, road rules ...”

Ko might not be quick on the road but she is still screaming around the world.

“I’m hoping it all goes upwards but it’s my third year on tour this year and it’s been much faster (her rise to No 1) than I would ever have expected.

“Obviously it has always been my goal to be the No 1 ranked player but I didn’t imagine it to be when I was 17 or 18. But it’s been really exciting, a lot of fun and I’ve been enjoying playing on the tours.

“So I’ve just got to have fun out there. I mean the scores are getting lower, lower every time. The girls are playing great golf so I know that to compete …. I need to play some solid golf myself,” she said.

Where once the field in any tournament stalked Webb, now it stalks Ko. Webb is used to it.

“I don’t really think about it (pressure) a whole lot. You know for the last handful of years or what have you that’s only been when I’ve come home to Australia.

“Every other week there’s always been someone who has the target on their back, so it’s not something that I think about a lot but I do enjoy coming home and playing in front of the home crowd,” Webb said.

Webb has won the Australian Open five times. To win a sixth she will have to battle fast and firm fairways, greens that were quickening with a hard-blowing afternoon wind and pin placements tucked close to bunkers.

And, of course, time.