LPGA official discusses decision not to suspend Kraft Nabisco Championship in light of wind conditions

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RANCHO MIRAGE -- As mentioned here, a strong desert win estimated between 20 mph and 30 mph became the theme of the day during the second round of the LPGA’s Kraft Nabisco Championship at Mission Hills Country Club in Rancho Mirage.

Winds started picking up at 12:30 p.m. I saw fallen leaves, sticks, broken bark and short tree limbs at nearly every hole I went to in the afternoon. Some debris was scattered just outside the ropes while some was also sprinkled on the fairway and the greens.

I saw broken bark land in the middle of the fairway of the 14th hole just as Brittany Lincicome placed her ball on the tee. I saw Morgan Pressel run after a fan’s hat, which blew onto the fairway just as shewas about to tee off at the ninth hole.

Players often waited as long as five minutes between shots in hopes the wind would die down.

It didn’t.

Angela Stanford, who added a 75 to her opening 67, suggested the play should have been stopped.

‘I don’t really know what unplayable is,’ she said. ‘I think if balls are rolling off greens, it probably is unplayable. But until like the last three or four holes, it really started to feel like, ‘Hmmm, I don’t know if we should be out here.’

Doug Brecht, the LPGA’s vice president of rules and competition, spoke with reporters about the decision not to halt play. Here is the transcript of the questions and answers that involve the blustery wind conditions.

Was there any point today a discussion about the possibility of suspending play because of conditions?

Brecht: We obviously started with some very calm, well, not calm, but fairly calm conditions. Calm compared to what we have now. This morning, around noon, the wind was clocked at 10 to 20 (mph) and since 10 a.m., it’s been a constant 20 to 30 (mph) since then. The last wind reporter I had was a constant wind speed of 31 miles an hour at 5 (p.m.).

I actually was positioned by the 18th green during the whole afternoon wave, because that was the green that was giving us the most difficulty; to help make the determination whether we need to continue play or suspend. I was in constant conversations with all the other rules officials working as a team, getting all their input. And in our opinion, the golf course played very, very difficult, very tough, but it was still playable. That’s why we made the decision never to suspend play today.

What are the specific reasons that play would be suspended?

Brecht: Mostly we were looking for was an exorbitant amount of movement of balls on the green due to wind situations. We did have some. At last count, it was somewhere between five and 10 balls that actually had some movement that was definitely attributable to the wind. But in watching, as I did, and I can’t speak to the other officials. I just got their input because I didn’t see what they saw. But from what I saw, the 18th green, which again was giving us the most difficulty, remained in a playable condition throughout the day. The most balls were on the 18th green; last count I had was four which moved due to what we felt, what we thought was some kind of wind or outside influence.

Was wind taken into consideration when the pins were placed today, and are there any pins that you had second thoughts about?

Brecht: The wind was taken in consideration when we set the golf course up Wednesday for Thursday. We were well aware of what might come today. The officials setting up the golf course set the golf course a little bit tougher yesterday, used a little bit more hole locations that may not have been quite as easy to get to yesterday, with the idea that it was going to be a two-day setup based on what the weather conditions were going to be today. That was done both hole location-wise and tee location-wise, to try to make as fair a contest as we possibly could based on the conditions that were going to present themselves.

There was never any report or thought about the fact that it might get dangerous to spectators or fans out there?

We had an occasional limb blow out of a tree. We didn’t see a large amount of palm fronds or anything like that. We had no reports of that. And we were stationed, three officials on the front (nine) and three officials on the back (nine), spread out over the entire golf course. If that would have happened, that definitely would have weighed in our decision and would have actually changed our decision.

-- Mark Medina