Golfer Leona Maguire on her professional debut and her hopes for women in sport

Co Cavan native Leona Maguire made her LPGA debut in Florida earlier this year, an achievement that has been fifteen years in production but all the more exciting as she only turned professional in June 2018. We talk about her involvement in 20x20 as an ambassador and how she was aware of a gap between some men’s and women’s sports from a young age.

“Some sports are obviously worse than others but reading the figures and the stats behind that was quite shocking,” she says. “Golf is one of those ones where we’ve been quite lucky and we get a lot of coverage from the media. I’ve been fortunate to travel the world but there are still clubs that are men only so those traditions are still there and in 2020, you think they’re outdated but there still is a lot of work to be done but the thing I always go back to is, if you look at some of our best athletes right now and some of our best medal prospects in the Olympics in Tokyo, they’re female athletes.

“The talent is there, it’s about creating opportunity and awareness. We saw the buzz of the Irish hockey team. People probably wouldn’t believe that was the first Irish team to get to a World Cup final so it’s crazy on some levels and also to see the progress being made in the last few years. There’s still a long way to go.”

While golf may not be one of the more physically demanding sports, it’s one of the more mentally demanding says Leona.

“People say that golf is a game of inches: inches on the golf course, yes, but also the inches between your two ears. Golf is my job so I spent every day in the gym, getting ready to plan courses, knowing the grass in different conditions, different countries, so there’s a lot that goes on behind the scenes. We’re playing 40 weeks out of the year, different countries, so you have to adjust on the fly to those different environments. Some weeks it goes well, some it doesn’t and you sit down, reassess. You can’t ride the rollercoaster: you can’t ride too high when you’re doing well and you can’t get too down on yourself.

“Golf is very relatable to life, to business, there’s a lot of transfer of those skills. You have to be patient, disciplined, you have to work hard. That’s the beauty of golf: it’s for everybody. You can start playing when you’re four and still be doing it when you’re 94. It’s out in the air, you’re getting exercise, there’s a lot of transferable things over to real life that many somebody may not realise.”

Even during lockdown – “that was the longest I’d been off a golf course since I was nine or ten” – Leona was able to practise and do gym work, but missed competing.

“I’ve always been very competitive; it didn’t really matter what it was – swimming, football at school, playing snakes and ladders,” she laughs, “and that was what I’d missed. It’s nice to putting in the hard work but it’s also nice to be in that competitive environment and that satisfaction of pulling off a shot when you have to do it. I’ve got to travel the world – the first time I was on an aeroplane it was for a golf tournament. I’ve been to Australia, Argentina, around the world, I’ve no doubt I wouldn’t have been to half of those places if it wasn’t for golf. I’ve also made friends that will last forever. I’ve been very fortunate with all the opportunities and all the doors that golf has opened for me and I always tell people that I have the best office in the world – it changes every week! It’s what I love doing and I’m lucky to be doing that.”

While attending events is important – or supporting in whatever possible – so too is inspiring younger potential players.

“Growing up for me, there was no Irish player on the LPGA, there was nobody on tour that I could look up to and think, ‘She’s like me, I could be like her one day’ so I had to look to the men, to Padraig Harrington and so on.

“My first big tournament was the Solheim Cup in Killeen Castle outside Dunshaughlin in 2011. That was really cool for me to walk alongside those pros and play in the Irish Open and thinking, ‘I could be like these girls one day.’ It’s great to see little girls in the crowds when you’re playing and it’s all about being that visibility. It doesn’t matter the sport; it’s about having someone to look up to and think, ‘They did it and maybe I can do it too.’ We’ve now two girls in the LPGA from Ireland [Leona and Stephanie Meadow].

“It’s only impossible until one person does it. I’m sure there’s thousands of girls around Ireland who have taken up boxing because of Katie Taylor, or Annalise Murphy or whoever it is, or everyone turning out for the hockey team. It’s a case of people knowing that it’s on – whether it’s on telly or if it’s a game they can go and watch.”

Follow Leona Maguire on twitter at @leona_maguire