Monday With Stacy Lewis, Brittany Lincicome, Brittany Lang and Lizette Salas

Apr 5, 2015; Rancho Mirage, CA, USA; Brittany Lincicome tees off on the sixth hole during the final round of the ANA Inspiration at Mission Hills CC – Dinah Shore Tournament Course. Mandatory Credit: Jake Roth-USA TODAY Sports

After Stacy Lewis, Brittany Lang and Lizette Salas finished their Sunday work at the Volunteers of America North Texas Shootout they hoofed it over to DFW, hopped on a plane and flew to South Carolina. There Brittany Lincicome, who didn’t play in Texas, joined them.

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The quartet from golf’s big stage, all of them members of the 2013 Solheim Cup Team USA and all of them looking to make the trip to Germany this fall for the 2015 Solheim Cup, drove to Greenwood, a little town with big dreams about 60 miles south of the Greenville-Spartanburg airport, to lend a hand at the 2nd edition of the Symetra Tour’s Self Regional Healthcare Foundation Women’s Health Classic, the singularly biggest purse on the Symetra Tour.

Monday started early for Lewis, Lincicome, Lang and Salas. The morning Pro-Am had a 7:30am shotgun start and they were anchoring the par-3s at The Links at Stoney Point. As Lewis explained to me, their job was to hit a good tee shot for each foursome and help us line up our putts.

Nancy Lopez holding court at the Monday Pro-Am. Photo credit: Dave Andrews

But first there was the little social hour that always precedes tee time.

Salas chatted with Hall of Famer Nancy Lopez while participants swirled around finding their proper places in the line-up for the shotgun start, and before she and other LPGA Legends Beth Daniel and Meg Mallon joined their respective star-struck foursomes for the morning Pro-Am.

Lopez, who’s been in and out of Greenwood for the past year supporting and guiding tournament organizers, has gained a substantial local fan club simply because Nancy Lopez is an unusually magnetic women.

Salas, relaxed and smiling and equally engaging before she started her morning’s work on the par-3 4th at Stoney Point, seems to be preparing to follow in Lopez’s footsteps.

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All four — Salas, Lincicome, Lewis and Lang — spent their morning hitting shots off the blue Symetra tees at the par-3s, swatting at the South Carolina mosquitoes and noseeums that are waking up now, and posing for cell phone photo ops. They were all remarkably good humored.

I wanted to get an Aim Point lesson from Lewis but didn’t have the guts to ask. The foursome behind us were already waiting on the tee box.

Stacy Lewis & Brittany Lincicome Clinic. Photo credit: Dave Andrews

After lunch Salas and Lang went back out on the course to help out at the par-3s with the afternoon Pro-Am and Lewis and Lincicome gave a clinic on the Stoney Point practice range, before they packed up again, got back on a plane and flew to Atlantic City, where they’re scheduled for a media day on Tuesday.

It was a hectic Monday that followed close on the heels of an exhausting tournament. As I moved through my day with them I came to better understand how these four women who week after week deliver stunning athletic performances are so much more than athletes.

In the finest LPGA tradition, Stacy Lewis, Brittany Lincicome, Brittany Lang and Lizette Salas also build into their already full schedules time for community and professional commitments that support the young Symetra Tour pros who will become their LPGA colleagues. They strengthen community engagement at the local level that’s so essential to sustaining professional golf at all levels; and they provide a special cheerleader reinforcement to recreational golfers of varying ability and with whom they cross paths.

I left their company refreshed by the understanding that all of us who swing a golf club share a unique bond grounded in our love of the game.

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