Stackhouse: KPMG elevates the LPGA Tour every year
KPMG ambassador Mariah Stackhouse joins Golf Central to share how KPMG has elevated the LPGA Tour every year, and why they're presence allows golfers to play up to their standards.
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USA Today
3 hours ago
- USA Today
Architect Gil Hanse on building a major a championship venue to test the best men and women
Architect Gil Hanse on building a major a championship venue to test the best men and women FRISCO, Texas – It's been a whirlwind stretch for architect Gil Hanse. From the renovations at Oakmont to his creation at PGA Frisco, Hanse's handiwork stands at the center of back-to-back major championships this month. The KPMG Women's PGA Championship marks the second major championship held at the PGA of America's sprawling Frisco campus, following the 2023 Senior PGA, staged shortly after the opening of Fields Ranch East. The course is scheduled to host a whopping 29 championships through 2034, including six majors. Golfweek caught up with Hanse on the eve of the KPMG, the third major on the LPGA's 2025 calendar. More: Golf architects Gil Hanse and Beau Welling like each other, and players will love what they've created at PGA Frisco Transitioning from old to new It's obviously very different from our full restoration of a golf course to a brand new golf course. I think my partner, Jim Wagner, and I love the idea that we're getting to show both sides. This golf course here, Fields Ranch East, is a lot more indicative of what we think of when we think of golf architecture – wider and angles are relevant here. We give you room to hit it off the tee, but if you're in the wrong spot, you're probably going to struggle with your second shot. Whereas Oakmont was just tight and difficult and that was the original architecture. Being able to show the ability to kind of live in the two different worlds of golf architecture is exciting for us, and it's tiring. (laughs) More: Cool things we saw in 2024: Frisco hot tub could be Ryder Cup hotspot Building for the best men and women in the world In a way, it's reminiscent of what we did in Rio for the (2016) Olympics, where we knew we were going to have multiple championships on that golf course, but we're also going to have men and women playing, so how do we set that up? We got a huge assist from Amy Alcott down in Rio and that kind of helped us understand a little bit more. Because a lot of people think, well, you just have to move the tees back and forwards and that's it, but if the women are hitting from the same landing areas as the men, the men are hitting 7-iron and they're hitting 5-iron, or maybe even higher. So you've got to get them to a place where it's commensurate with the shot values of the hole. One of the more interesting aspects of what we did in Rio and here was that we had multiple sets of bunkers or hazards, water hazards that are in play which would be in play for the women in the main landing area, but the longer men, Rory and Bryson, might hit it there. This golf course is all the same grass, with the exception of the greens, so we can manipulate the mowing lines any way we want to. So if we want to make it wider this week and narrow it for '27 (PGA Championship), we can do that, but we also had to figure out, we don't want to narrow it, have bunkers sitting 20 yards out in the rough that are irrelevant. So we had to kind of figure out how do we bunker one side of the hole that we can keep the fairway right up against them, and then bring it in from the other side, and then same thing with the multiple sets of hazards for different classes of player. So it's a little bit of a jigsaw puzzle in that regard, which was, to be honest, pretty exciting. The Amy Alcott influence There was a lot of conversations (in Rio) about those sort of landing areas, the angles and needing to make sure, you know, if we're asking a male professional golfer to hit a shot in, they're more than likely going to get much more elevation on the shot, and we needed to make sure that hole locations that were going to be tucked behind bunkers or behind ridges, etc., that we got the women golfers far enough up that the elevation of their shots could actually match and hold the green. So it's not only distance, but it was a lot of talk about trajectory. What the land provided This golf course is really divided. There are natural holes, so you go, you know, two, three, four, five, six, and seven are more natural. And then on the back line, it would be 13, 14, 15, and 16 are natural. All the other holes we just had to create, all totally artificial. We hope that we did enough earthwork, that we made them look natural, and the people wouldn't know, they would just feel as if it's the entire golf course, but the holes we had to manipulate were for two reasons: They were dead flat and not very interesting, but they were also in the flood plain. We had to elevate them to get them out of the 100-year flood plain, so that, you know, it looks like this week, touch wood, we're going to be dry. But in May, we get a lot of thunderstorms in this area and the creek floods pretty good. So we had to build these holes up. It was not an easy build, because the dirt here was really bad. The philosophy of 'ribbon tees' I mean, we've always been big believers in multiple options, and the ability to kind of move things around, and sometimes it's hard for people to understand or accept, because they think, well, I got to post a score. … We just want to create different options because it's super windy here. If the wind is blowing, you can always move tees up, and you're not limited to just the pods. You have a lot of flexibility in the setup of the golf course. You also feel like there's a way where you can correlate tee setup with hole locations. You can put a difficult hole location and move the tees up on that day. Or a benign hole location moving the tees back. So we just love the flexibility these ribbon tees give to you, and we also love the presentation. They just kind of feel as if they're extensions of the fairway, just kind of wander, ripple their way down.
NBC Sports
4 hours ago
- NBC Sports
Walsh details KPMG Women's historic purse increase
KPMG Chair and CEO-elect Tim Walsh catches up with Anna Jackson about why he's "incredibly proud" about the increased purse for the KPMG Women's PGA Championship, how AI will play a role in the event, and more.
Newsweek
5 hours ago
- Newsweek
LPGA Tour Sees Historic Purse Increase at Women's PGA Championship
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. Just hours before the tee-off of the KPMG Women's PGA Championship, the golf world in general, and the players in the field in particular, were surprised by the always welcome news of the event's purse increase. Even better, it's a record-tying jump. The purse for the LPGA's third major of the season will be $12 million, which ties the record for the highest purse in women's major championship history set for the U.S. Women's Open. This is $1.6 million more than the previous edition. The winner's trophy is seen on the first tee during the first round of the KPMG Women's PGA Championship on the West Course at the Westchester Country Club on June 11, 2015 in Harrison, New... The winner's trophy is seen on the first tee during the first round of the KPMG Women's PGA Championship on the West Course at the Westchester Country Club on June 11, 2015 in Harrison, New York. MoreThe winner's paycheck will be $2.4 million, $840,000 more than Amy Yang received when she won in 2024. "KPMG has put so much into it, they really make sure we're delivering," said Jeff Price, the PGA of America's chief commercial officer, according to Sports Business Journal. "Everything that we've been able to do together is a testament to their commitment." Shawn Quill, who heads up the title sponsor's sports industry relations, stated that KPMG is fully committed to growing the Women's PGA Championship further. "When we came in as title sponsor, it was a time when women's sports wasn't en vogue," he said. "We weren't early to the party, we were before the party was conceptualized. We're at a real tipping point in women's sports. The next 10 years are going to change a lot more than the last 10 did." Proudly celebrating excellence in women's golf. The 2025 @KPMGWomensPGA will feature a $12 million purse, tied for highest on the LPGA Tour. Full announcement with Championship tech enhancements, field and broadcast information: — KPMG Sports (@KPMGSports) June 17, 2025 Much progress has been made since the inaugural edition of the event in 1955, when the prize purse was set at $6,000. The Women's PGA Championship purse has grown slowly but steadily, with three notable increases. The first was in 1977, when it went from $55,000 to $150,000. The second occurred in 1990, when it rose from $500,000 to $1 million, and the third in 2022, when it jumped from $4.5 million to $9 million. KPMG Women's PGA Championship Purse Payout Below is the projected payout for the Women's PGA Championship. Amounts may vary depending on ties: 1 $2,400,000 2 $1,296,000 3 $809,242 4 $567,305 5 $472,511 6 $418,969 7 $377,717 8 $338,290 9 $306,165 10 $281,219 11 $256,638 12 $237,290 13 $221,105 14 $204,069 15 $189,467 16 $177,298 17 $167,563 18 $157,828 19 $148,093 20 $138,358 21 $129,961 22 $121,565 23 $113,412 24 $105,867 25 $99,296 26 $93,699 27 $89,440 28 $85,667 29 $82,017 30 $78,366 31 $74,715 32 $71,065 33 $67,414 34 $64,129 35 $61,452 36 $58,774 37 $56,219 38 $53,785 39 $51,352 40 $48,918 41 $46,484 42 $44,050 43 $41,617 44 $39,183 45 $36,749 46 $34,559 47 $32,368 48 $30,300 49 $29,083 50 $27,866 51 $27,136 52 $26,527 53 $26,041 54 $25,797 More Golf: Justin Rose Drops 'Strong' Reaction to Ryder Cup Landing First Euro Player
