How to Win the Kraft Nabisco Championship

The LPGA’s first Major of the year tees off this morning, as the Kraft Nabisco Championship gets underway in Rancho Mirage.  

Michelle Wie, Morgan Pressel and Yani Tseng all know this course well. They broke down the strategy for the Dinah Shore Tournament Course at Mission Hills Country Club. 

“Obviously, if you don’t play well, it can bite you,” said part-time desert resident Wie.  “You’ve got to hit it in the fairway here, got to put it on the right part of the green and got to play it smart.  It’s a major, so pars are good, birdies are great, and you’ve got to go out there and keep trucking along.”  

“ I guess the first strategy is not thinking you have to be a bomber to play well,” Morgan Pressel said.   Pressel became the youngest player to win a major when she won the KNC in 2007.  “I feel like I certainly have history on this golf course and have played well on the past, and I think that feeds on itself.  It gives me confidence going off on the first tee knowing that I have played well here before and that I feel comfortable here more than anything.” 

2010 winner and current world #1 ranked player Yani Tseng agrees that being comfortable and familiar with the course is an advantage. 

“The first time I played here was 2007 for Q-school, and after that I came here every year and played this course,” Tseng said.  “There’s lots of par-5s I can reach.  It’s not easy to hit driver every hole here.  You have to hit all the different shots, hitting draws, hitting fades.  You need to play good to win this tournament.  You won’t get lucky and win this.”

 Pressel thinks that you need to focus on the greens to have success.  

“I mean these greens are tough,” she says. “They’re not easy to read, and the getting up-and-down- around them is almost just as important to hitting it long off the tee.  So it’s always about making birdies and this I think this year with the rough being a litte bit lower than usual, it will be all about making birdies, and to do that you have to make putts.” 

So to win at the KNC, you need to be able to be comfortable with the course itself, have a full arsenal of shots at your request, and be able to read greens like a cartographer.   

In other words, if you’re in the field this week, you have to be at the top of your game to make the famous leap into Poppie’s Pond and holding the most coveted trophy on the LPGA tour.

You can follow the KNC with live scoring here.