With five career wins on the Korean Ladies Professional Golf Association (KLPGA) Tour, Lee So-mi, 25, cites her “impatience” as her biggest flaw.
After finishing second on the Q-Series of the U.S. Women’s Professional Golf (LPGA) Tour late last year, Lee will make her U.S. Tour debut at the LPGA Drive-On Championship ($1.75 million purse), which begins on May 25. “There are a lot of goals I want to achieve in my first year, such as winning and being the rookie of the year, but first, I need to mentally manage my personality,” Isomi said before departing.
Lee departed for the Palm Springs, California, camp on Thursday for some light training and jet lag ahead of her debut. After making her debut next week in Bradenton, Florida, she will return to camp to continue her training and begin playing in mid-February at the Aramco Saudi Ladies International ($5 million purse) on the Ladies European Tour (LET). This will be followed by the LPGA Asian swing, which will begin in March at the Blue Bay LPGA (China).
“A lot of people around me are rooting for me to win the Rookie of the Year,” said Isomi. “I’m greedy, but I’ve often been too obsessed with my goals and messed up because I was too attached to the outcome. Instead, I want to work on small tasks every day, do my best, and accomplish them step by step.”
While there’s a lot to work on across the board – her long game, short game, and putts – Isomi also plans to focus on technical improvements to increase the trajectory of her shots. Isomi’s shots have a reputation for flying low. This is why he often wins in strong winds.
While this is an advantage on U.S. courses, where dry, firm fairways give him a lot of distance advantage, his inability to generate high trajectory from short distances is a major weakness. “Technically, I’m better at hitting low trajectories than anyone else, but I’m not good at hitting high trajectories. On a difficult course like a major, a high trajectory is an advantage, so I’m going to work on that.”
It’s a fresh start in an unfamiliar environment, and there are a lot of things I don’t have yet. For the time being, she plans to settle in with her father and move from tournament to tournament.
“On the KLPGA Tour, I’ve been doing my best every year and starting the season with a lot of nerves, so I don’t think my mindset will be any different on the LPGA,” said Lee. “I’ll play hard to win every tournament, so please give me a lot of support.”
