TARZANA, Calif.— Ingrid Lindblad returned here to El Caballero Country Club, a place that was filled with smiles and celebration and exuberance one year ago.
She came back with some of that same confidence that helped her win the JM Eagle LA Championship. There are all those good memories from her first win as a rookie—in her fourth start on the LPGA Tour—but she also carries doubt, uncertainty and emotion this time around.
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Lindblad made a recent post last month about the struggles with her game and not knowing where the ball will go off the tee. She was raw, open and candid about those feelings for the first time in a news conference on Tuesday. In front of a microphone, she answered about a dozen questions about the challenges she faces from why to how, but it was one anecdote that made her wipe away tears.
She shot an 82 in finishing a tough round Saturday in February’s HSBC Women’s World Championship in a grouping with Stephanie Kyriacou when Kyriacou said something that made her question everything. Kyriacou simply said she’d see Lindblad the next day.
“I was like, ‘I’m not sure I want to come to the golf course tomorrow,’ Lindblad said, her eyes welling with tears recalling that conversation. “I did, which I’m very happy about. But it was hard. There have been times I just don’t want to play because it isn’t great. … I was talking to my coaches and they were like, ‘I mean we wouldn’t blame you if you don’t play.’
“I’m happy I did and it was hard because I was like, ‘I really don’t want to hit drivers.’ There were a couple holes where I’m hitting a 4-wood out. I just want to get out of here. That’s not where I want to be on a golf course, obviously.”
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Lindblad shot a final-round 77 and finished last in that tournament. She went home to Sweden for a couple of weeks and worked on her game. She had to shut the comments from that Instagram post because there were so many thoughts. There were well wishes and then so many people who wanted to fix her problems, many of whom wanted her to get a new swing coach. That’s not what she wanted.
Her troubles have come with her driver, and it’s been something she’s tried to fix.
“I’ve had some big misses off the tee box so I’ve started to see things that are kind of far out from the fairway that I’m supposed to hit it to,” Lindblad said. “It’s been kind of a lot of steering off the tee box. If I see something right, I definitely can’t hit it right. I just hit it left instead. There is no way of playing golf like that. You can’t steer away from everything. It’s not going to work. So a lot of swings with full speed, just trying to see the target and just accepting that there is water right or OB left, and just if it misses, it misses.
“That’s part of it. You’re going to miss a couple. You’re not going to hit everything perfect. Just need to hit a couple better than the big miss.”
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Lindblad wasn’t able to take full advantage of her first win in L.A. She hasn’t had any any top-10s on the LPGA after that and just one top-20 finish. She finished tied for 26th in the season-ending CME Group Tour Championship.
But the signs of trouble on the tee box started at a major.
“I think I know exactly what tournament it started at,” she said. “I think when we played the KPMG [Women’s PGA Championship [in Frisco, Texas] last year and it was really windy. I think it started with that I didn’t trust the wind, so if it was blowing a lot like right to left, I kind of blocked it to not blow too far left. Same thing going the opposite way. I kind of just tried to snap hook it into the wind when it’s blowing left to right. I don’t know if it scarred me a little bit and I just didn’t trust the wind. There has been a couple of tournaments where it’s been OK. Hit a few drivers at a couple events. It’s been fine. Then I start seeing things and then it starts to go sideways a little bit.”
She got through the rest of the year but missed the cut at the next two majors, the Evian Championship and AIG Women’s British Open. She was tied for 52nd at the Chevron Championship and was 35th at the U.S. Women’s Open in the first two majors of the year.
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Then came a sophomore slump. She was in a dire rut and she couldn’t get out of it. She had no roadmap for this as she’d never dealt with prolonged problems like this, a debilitating issue off the tee box.
After the Asia swing, her problems followed her back in the U.S., where she shot a first-round 82 in the Fortinet Founders Cup and missed the cut and then missed the cut at the Ford Championship, although she played better there. This is her first start since the consecutive missed cuts.
Part of her work has been on not taking a score home with her.
“I think I’ve judged myself a lot based on my score, so lately been trying to do things that make me feel good on and off the golf course,” Lindblad said. “Been trying to do stats before I leave the golf course, so I don’t have to bring it back to the hotel room. Try to do things that are outside of the golf course just to kind of let it go. On the golf course, just not look so much about the score, be more trusting, especially the driver. If we miss one, we miss one. It’s kind of part of the process. Just trying to not judge myself based on a score.”
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She feels like she’s in a better place, especially here, just north of Los Angeles, where she lifted the tournament’s heavy trophy. It’s still in a box since she’s moving to a different place in the fall, but the memories are palpable.
“It’s all just happy memories. It’s been nice. I played nine today and nine yesterday,” Lindblad said. “I’m like, ‘I remember this hole. I remember what I did here.’ So it’s been two nice practice rounds. Everything is very familiar.”
What’s unfamiliar is the problem, and Lindblad think she’s in good shape to solve her problems.
“I feel like we’ve been working on some good things. I had two weeks after Singapore when I went back to Sweden, and not going to lie, I came back to San Francisco and I was like, ‘I’m hitting the ball so good I’m going to win this week.’ Did not win in San Francisco. But I had been working two weeks at home. Didn’t play anything because our course wasn’t open. It was March in Sweden and not much is open. But I was hitting the ball so good, then I came to Sharon Heights and I was like, ‘Whoa, this is scary. Trees everywhere.’”
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She paused and asked the reporter to remind her of the question she’d asked.
“I feel like we definitely are working on the right things. I did see a lot of good things when we played in Phoenix. Phoenix was more my putting that wasn’t great,” Lindblad said. “That was actually nice to see that I drove it a lot better in Phoenix than lately. I think a lot of it is just like trusting the line off the tee and making a good swing at it. I definitely think we’re moving in the right direction.”
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