US Women`s Open winner Ryu dedicates victory to her mother

“Mom, this rice tastes strange.”

This is what 21-year-old golfer Ryu So-yeon told her mother Cho Kwang-ja, 55, before she won the U.S. Women`s Open in her debut at a major LPGA Tour. The tournament was concluded Monday at the par-71 East Course of the Broadmoor in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Cho has accompanied and taken care of Ryu whenever her daughter plays in overseas championships. This time, the mother took cookware and Ryu`s favorite side dishes to the U.S., stir-frying kimchi in oil to prevent smell and arranging accommodations that allow cooking.

Rice, however, did not turn out well because of low pressure. The place they stayed was 1,800 meters above sea level.

“I recalled that the same thing happened when I cooked on mountains in the past,” Cho said. After that, she put books or a heavy cup on the lid of a pot when she cooked rice to ensure the taste.

Competitions were often suspended due to bad weather and golfers had difficulty eating on time. Cho would then prepare small seaweed rolls with fried anchovies to feed her daughter whenever Ryu felt hungry.

As if repaying her mother’s efforts, Ryu won the U.S. Women`s Open title. Ryu raised the silver trophy high and hugged her mother in happiness.

“It’s because of meals. Good meals helped me reap good results. I`ll join the LPGA Tour down the road so my mother might have to learn English in advance,” Ryu said with a smile.

Cho said she is proud of her daughter, who is still a little girl to her. “It hasn’t really sunk in yet. Though So-yeon was born three weeks late, she weighed less than 3 kilograms. So I was worried about her but she grew up well and has always been bright and confident.”

Ryu did not play golf as a young child. Instead, she began took up the violin at age 5 and then turned to golf as a second grader at Seoul’s Sejong Elementary School.

“I remember starting golf on a Wednesday. Several days later on a Tuesday, I watched on TV Pak Se-ri winning her first U.S. Women`s Open. I was very impressed,” Ryu said.

Ryu, however, dreamed of being a violinist. “I learned not only the violin but also the flute and the piano. I also had concerts. Playing golf was an afterschool hobby,” she said.

In the eighth grade, however, Ryu decided to concentrate on golf. “In the case of violin, judgments differ among listeners. In contrast, scores are everything in golf. I thought that my ability could be properly recognized in golf,” she said.

Despite this, Ryu would play the piano whenever she was exhausted mentally and physically. “I`m practicing Tchaikovsky’s piano concerto but it’s not easy. I`ll let you hear me play the piece sometime,” she said.

Musical knowledge attained as a youth was helpful in playing golf, helping Ryu exercise her imagination on the golf course and perform well in the delicate short game.

Thanks to her mother’s devotion to her education, Ryu took English lessons every Saturday for two years at the U.S. Army base in Seoul’s Yongsan district when she was in elementary school.

“So-yeon could get over her fear of speaking English while meeting foreigners. She could speak English earlier than others,” her mother said.

Since last year, Ryu has taken English lessons from ethnic Koreans from the U.S. and Canada to join the LPGA Tour.

Ryu hardly used interpreters in interviews with American media such as NBC and ESPN, and at the news conference after her victory.

An LPGA source said, “It’s impressive to see her confidently giving interviews in English though she made small mistakes. She is positive and outgoing.”

Ryu received 585,000 dollars in prize money and more than 280,000 dollars as a bonus from Hanwha, her management company.

On how she will spend the money, Ryu gave an unexpected answer. She said she wants to spend the money on her younger sister, who wants to be a violinist. Her sister is two years younger than Ryu and is studying English in the U.S. before studying violin there.

“Tuition at the school my sister wants to go to is very high. I haven’t played the role of older sister due to golf, so I’d like to be a big spender for her this time,” Ryu said.

kjs0123@donga.com