Hanson Dismisses Driver, Makes Cut Club Change Lifts Rathdrum Golfer’s Fortunes

Rathdrum’s Tracy Hanson finally gave her unruly driver the ax Friday morning. It was a tough call. Firing an old friend always is - especially in the middle of the world’s premier women’s golf tournament.

But it was her and caddy Ken Struckman’s decision to hand her 1-wood a pink slip that ultimately allowed Hanson to slip into the final two rounds of the 1997 United States Women’s Open.

“We made an executive decision on the third hole that we weren’t going to hit driver any more,” Struckman explained just moments after Hanson carded a 1-over-par 72 on her second tour of Pumpkin Ridge Golf Club’s Witch Hollow course. “We played the last 16 holes with a 3-wood off the tee.”

It was a risky move, considering the length of several par-4s on the 6,365-yard layout. But it proved to be a sound one as Hanson played those final 16 holes one stroke under par and survived the second-round cut with a two-day total of 5-over 147.

So how did she celebrate?

“I’m going to practice a little bit and then I’m going shopping,” Hanson said after rolling in a tricky 6-foot putt for a par 5 on the treacherous 494-yard finishing hole.

“REI, here I come!”

Hanson is 11 strokes off the lead, and one shot back of another player with local connections - Clarkston’s Robin Walton, who also shot 72.

Much earlier in the day, it didn’t look like the 25-year-old Hanson would have much reason to celebrate. After struggling with her wayward driver and posting a 4-over 75 Thursday, she opened Friday’s second round by driving into a bunker and making bogey on the first hole.

She then three-putted the par-3 second for a bogey that pushed her six strokes over par before bagging her driver - perhaps for the rest of the tournament.

From that point on, she started finding short grass off the tee, hitting greens in regulation and stringing together pars. She made a birdie on the par-3 fifth and canceled a bogey at No. 9 with another birdie on 17. “I played more from the fairway today, which definitely helps,” said Hanson, who had missed the cut in her last two U.S. Opens after tying for 23rd and finishing as the low amateur in 1991.

“I’m more confident with my 3-wood, so I can swing it rather than being tentative off the tee.” Hanson’s round could have been worse had it not been for a scrambling par on the par-3 10th. But it could also have been a lot better had any of three excellent birdie putts at 14, 15 and 16 dropped.

Instead, all three came up “short in the jaws,” by Hanson’s description. That forced her to par the difficult 18th despite laying up 25 yards short of her playing partners off the tee.

Her short drive left her more than 260 yards from the green and facing a 200-yard carry over a vast expanse of wasteland to reach the next stretch of the dissected fairway. She hit another 3-wood over the hazard, but didn’t reach the fairway.

She left her approach shot out of the rough, short and right of the green, but chipped to within 6 feet and made the putt for par.

“We were laughing about it in the fairway - that not many people were playing 3-wood, 3-wood on the 18th,” Struckman said. “We couldn’t lay up because if we do, we make bogey, and if we make bogey, we’re out of it.”

Hanson recalled the decision as being a bit less strategic.

“There was never any doubt in my mind as far as going for it was concerned,” she said. “That’s just my game. I pull the 3-wood and go.

“I thinned it a little bit, too, so I had plenty of club.”

And now she has a couple of extra days at the U.S. Open to nurture her new friendship with her 3-wood.

, DataTimes