Thomson looks to learn from nationals

For Chrissy Thomson, her trip to the national ladies amateur championship in Quebec last week was full of bittersweet memories.
Thomson—part of Team Manitoba—participated in the championship for the first time in her career learning a lot, enjoying the experience, but not playing her best golf.
“It was a good experience for me even if I didn’t play as well as I’d liked,” Thomson said upon returning to Fort Frances from the Blainville golf course just north of Montreal.
“The golf course was amazing,” she noted. “It’s a really beautiful, difficult golf course.
“To play that golf course was a treat,” she added. “It’s completely different than what you practice on.”
Thomson admitted the course definitely was a distraction while golfing.
“I paid attention to the course, it’s beauty and how difficult it is, and the tough competition,” she explained, adding she wasn’t focused enough on the game.
“I learned I have a lot of work to do on my mental game,” she admitted. “I need to believe in myself more.
“I think I’m pretty happy in the way I prepared for it,” Thomson added. “I was very confident with my game but still needed to prepare better mentally.
“I was confident. I played respectably the first day, but make some poor shots and the confidence drifts away.”
Thomson blamed her meltdown on her mental game, her focus on the game, rather than being intimidated by the strong field at Blainville.
“In the past, I went to juniors [national] and saw all these great players and I was intimidated,” she remarked. “I said to my dad [Bob], who was caddying for me, ‘I’m not intimidated by these girls any more.’
“It was a great experience, I got to golf with the best golfers in Canada,” Thomson enthused. “I saw when I’m on my game, I can compete [with them], but I lacked some consistency.”
She explained the tough course could get you into trouble in a hurry. The course was tight off the tee, making it hard to land the ball in the short grass, and the rough made it tough to make better than a double bogey.
“The greens were very difficult,” she noted. “There were lots of slope and very fast.
“In this tournament, one bad shot could cost a lot of strokes,” she said. “I learned I need work on my short game, too.”
The tournament wasn’t all disappointment, though. Thomson shot a decent round—a plus-nine 81—on the first day last Tuesday. In fact, her whole team played fairly well the first day.
“We were actually leading [the team gross score standings] by one shot [after the first day], which is unheard of for Manitoba,” said Thomson.
“Manitoba golf is getting a lot stronger,” she added.
She and her teammates—Jill Hardy, Heather McMunn, and Stacey Bieber—were leading both the gross and net score team categories after the first day.
“The second day, we kinda fell behind,” Thomson remarked.
All was not lost, though. Team Manitoba picked up the two-day team trophy for low net score—after handicaps for average rounds were calculated. An accomplishment even if not the most sought-after award.
“It’s not really what every team dreams about,” said Thomson, who did receive a Canadian Ladies Golf Association medallion for the feat. “You kinda get the nickname sand-baggers.
“You don’t know it’s for the net prize until you flip it over,” she joked about the medallion.
Thomson’s scores on the second and third days of the tournament last Wednesday and Thursday weren’t as good, carding rounds of 90 and 89, respectively, for a +44 total—leaving her in 74th spot.
As such, she missed the cut of the top 48 players plus ties for the final round Friday.
McMunn and Bieber made the cut, finishing tied for 20th and 36th, respectively.
The winner was 23-year-old Lisa Meldrum of Kirkland, Que., who rallied from fourth place after the first round to capture her third-straight national amateur championship—the first player in 27 years to accomplish that feat.
“When you get there and you’ve got the mindset you want to compete, you feel horrible,” Thomson said of missing the cut. “It’s just one of those weeks you kinda forget about and move on.”
And move on she will.
Though she’s “done for the summer,” Thomson won’t have much time to relax before getting back into serious golf again. She’ll make her way back her U.S. college team—the St. John’s Red Storm based in Queens, N.Y.—at the end of the month.
“I think our team is going to be stronger than last year,” Thomson predicted. “We have all the same girls and have more experience. The one thing that brought us down were nerves.
“This year we know what to expect.”
Thomson has set some personal goals for the coming season, too.
“I want to play consistently well in the next few tournaments,” she remarked. “I want to get consistency into my game, and maybe win a college event.
“The team wants to make it to some championships,” she added. “Hopefully to the NCAA championships.
“Next summer, I definitely want to qualify for the U.S. amateur as well as the Manitoba and national amateurs,” Thomson concluded.