- Laura Baugh
Laura Zonetta Baugh (born
May 31 ,1955 inGainesville, Florida ) is an Americangolf champion. As a child she won the National PeeWee Championship five times, her first coming at age 3. Her parents divorced when she was 11 years old and she moved with her mother from their Florida home toLong Beach, California . She studied briefly there atLong Beach City College andCalifornia State University, Long Beach .Lacking the money to pay green fees, she and friends would sneak onto golf courses to play. At age 14 she won her first of two straight Los Angeles Women's City Golf Championships. In 1971, at the Atlanta Country Club in
Atlanta, Georgia , she defeated Beth Barry to win theUnited States Women's Amateur Golf Championship . Her physical appearance brought her considerable publicity and for 1971 she was chosen as aLos Angeles Times "Woman of the Year" and Golf Digest's 1972 "Most Beautiful Golfer." She made a commercial for UltraBrite toothpaste that won a Clio Award.Baugh was a member of the U.S. teams that won the 1972
Curtis Cup and theWorld Amateur Golf Team Championships . She then turned professional and joined the LPGA Tour in 1973 where she earned Rookie of the Year honors. Despite her successful start and prodigious talent,alcoholism and emotional problems would take over her life and she would never win an LPGA tournament. Her drinking caused spontaneous bleeding that could have ended her life had she not sought treatment that included time at theBetty Ford Clinic in 1996. She described her battle with alcohol in a 1999 book titled "Out of the Rough"."During her professional golfing career from 1973 through 1997, Baugh earned 66 Top 10 finishes, including ten runner-ups. She became a member of the Women's Senior Golf Tour and has also worked as a television announcer for
The Golf Channel and operates "Laura Baugh Golf Workshops for Women Only" [http://www.laurabaugh.com/] .Baugh has been married four times, twice to the father of her seven children.
References
* "Out of the Rough : An Intimate Portrait of Laura Baugh and Her Sobering Journey" by Laura Baugh and
Steve Eubanks , with aForeword byArnold Palmer . (1999)Rutledge Hill Press ISBN 1-55853-755-4External links
* [http://www.lpga.com/player_results.aspx?id=5066 Profile on the LPGA's official site]
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.