Tschetter Is On Course With Two New Hips

HAVRE DE GRACE, Md., June 12 -- Kris Tschetter's Friday began at 3:30 a.m., when her 4-year-old daughter Kyra awoke in their hotel room. Kyra, it seems, didn't care about her mom's impending tee time in the second round of the McDonald's LPGA Championship, nor did she care about the pair of replaced hips that would carry her mom around Bulle Rock Golf Course.

A 4-year-old, even in the wee hours, has a lot of questions. So Tschetter did what she could, eventually handing Kyra her laptop, something of an electronic pacifier, and said something to the effect of, "Stop asking me."

This would explain, in part, why Tschetter rolled in a birdie putt on her 17th hole of the day -- a stroke that got her to 5 under par for the tournament, just two off the lead at the time -- and headed straight for a green-side chair, badly in need of a rest. But attributing such fatigue to one early morning with her two daughters would dismiss the journey it took for Tschetter to get here.

When the third round of the LPGA's second major championship of the year begins here Saturday, Tschetter will trail leader Anna Nordqvist of Sweden by six shots, with 14 players -- including top-ranked Lorena Ochoa -- in between. Nordqvist followed her opening-round 66 with a 70 to stand at 8-under 136, a shot ahead of first-round leader Nicole Castrale of California. Nordqvist is playing in her fifth tournament as a professional, her first major, though she twice played in the Women's British Open as an amateur. Tschetter teed it up for the 462nd time as a pro.

"I'm here to learn," Nordqvist said. "We'll see in the next couple of days. I'm just going to try to focus on my game, and if I'm ready, I'm ready."

Tschetter's rounds of 70 and 72 -- which have her sitting at 2-under 142 -- appear less impressive. But consider that Tschetter, who makes her home in Warrenton, had her right hip replaced in the summer of 2007, then her left hip replaced last November. Consider, too, that she played just four events in 2007 and nine more last year, and it's easy to understand -- after she finished a promising round with a bogey, then a double-bogey that included two shots out of some tall weeds -- why she would say, "Things can't be too bad."

"It's good to be back playing," Tschetter said, "and making some putts."

There were days, earlier this decade, when that wasn't possible. Each step brought pain. Tschetter would play a tournament, deal with the hip problem, take some time off, start again, stop, get checked out, try once more. But all the while, pain. Since 2000, she has carried a folding chair on her bag, and she uses it frequently, particularly at a hilly layout like Bulle Rock.

But now, at 45, she is playing in her seventh tournament of the year, and she made her fourth cut. She has not finished higher than tied for 47th this year. This week, she just might.

"This comeback -- I've had so many -- but the latest one has seemed to take longer to get my distance back and my speed back," Tschetter said. "Normally, a couple weeks, and I feel like I've got my speed back. I just am now starting to feel like I've got that back."

The players who dot the leader board here have never had to deal with such issues. Nordqvist turned 22 Wednesday and is a tour rookie who played college golf at Arizona State. Castrale, 30, has one win over the course of a career that began with her first LPGA appearance in 2002. Katherine Hull and Lindsey Wright, who are two shots back at 6 under, both grew up in Australia, both played their college golf at Pepperdine, and have just one LPGA win between them (Hull's victory at last year's Canadian Women's Open).

They are, though, dealing with the idea that the tour's future stars -- many of them born after Tschetter made her first appearance in an LPGA event in 1984, and some even after her rookie year of 1988 -- must win, and win now, on a tour that no longer includes retired star Annika Sorenstam, who was Nordqvist's role model growing up.

"The thing is, we've got more players out here that can win every week," Hull said. "So that's making it harder for, obviously, the young ones to win."

Tschetter, whose lone win came in 1992 and whose best performance might have been a runner-up finish to Sorenstam at the 1996 U.S. Women's Open, is not dealing with that kind of pressure. But she does have, she said, "some lofty goals."

"I want to play well and compete and get myself in the game," she said.

With that, her 6-year-old daughter Lainey, who had walked the entire course following her mother -- barefoot -- tugged at Tschetter's shirt. Lainey is now in kindergarten, making it harder for Tschetter to leave home.

So the question, even as she flirted with the leader board at a major championship, is easy. With two new hips and $2.9 million earned on tour over the past 21 years, with two young daughters back home in Warrenton, why continue to play?

"I just love it," she said. "I really do. And I think being injured makes you appreciate it more and want it more. I don't think I've ever really felt burnt out on golf or playing on tour. I've always wanted more. I just feel like I still have some good golf in me, and I love doing it."