By David Shefter, USGA

Edina, Minn. – Cristie Kerr just completely lost it.

Hat pulled over her face, tears began erupting from her eyes like a second coming of Mount Vesuvius.

All the sacrifice and hard work, all those years of crisscrossing the country to play in top junior tournaments, all those years of mentoring from people like Charlie DeLucca, Jim McLean and Bryan Lebedevitch, all the talk that she should have gone to college instead of turning pro out of Sunset High in Miami, Fla., all the media talk about her 0-for-41 drought in majors had burst through the surface in a tidal wave of emotions on the 18th green at Pine Needles Resort in Southern Pines, N.C.

Kerr had done her best to control her feelings in the fairway. But after securing one final par, she now could finally let go. Jumping into the arms of her husband/manager, Erik Stevens, Kerr knew the 2007 U.S. Women’s Open belonged to her. A lifetime of blood, sweat and dreams was now reality. She was finally a national champion and owner of a major title.

And it felt, oh, so good.

"It’s the reason why I got into golf," said the 30-year-old Kerr at 2008 U.S. Women’s Open Media Day on May 19 at Interlachen Country Club. "It’s the coolest thing that I could ever really accomplish. The fun thing is now that I’ve won one, I want to do it again."

Don’t put it past Kerr to have a repeat performance, perhaps as early as late June in Minnesota. Like

Pine Needles, Interlachen is a Donald Ross layout. Kerr seems to have a thing for Ross courses. In three Women’s Opens at Pine Needles, she finished as low amateur in 1996, tied for fourth in 2001 and then took the championship in ’07. While Interlachen has never played host to a Women’s Open, it was the site for the Solheim Cup, where Kerr helped the Americans to a victory over their European counterparts six years ago.

Ross courses require skill, precision and, most of all, intestinal fortitude, an intangible that is not in short

Before taking a victorious knee last year, Cristie Kerr watches her final putt on the 18th hole drop in at Pine Needles. (John Mummert/USGA)

supply with Kerr. And a sense of history isn’t lost on her, either. Interlachen was where Bob Jones completed leg three of his historic "Grand Slam" in 1930 and where legendary LPGA player and Minneapolis native Patty Berg was runner-up in the Women’s Amateur in 1935. In 1947 Patty Berg won the inaugural Women’s Open there and then became an honorary member of Interlachen. A tribute to both players can be found in a side-by-side display in Interlachen’s clubhouse.

When Kerr competed in her first Women’s Open as an amateur 13 years ago at The Broadmoor, she ran into Berg and peppered the Hall of Famer with questions about what it took to become a champion.

Berg listed the key elements for any champion: desire, dedication, determination, the will to win - and not the wish to win - inspiration, never giving up, self-control, heart, striving for perfection, using your mind, and faith in God.

"People had asked me … why I wore red, white and blue on Sunday last year, and that was to honor her," said Kerr of Berg, who died in 2006 at the age of 88. "That's why I did that.

"[In 1995] I said, ‘Hey, Patty, I feel like I want to win this championship one day. Do you think I'm good enough?' And she said, ‘Well, Cristie, you know, you just have to bleed red, white, and blue. You have to have the heart, and you have the game you can do it.’ And she watched me hit balls and she said, ‘I think you're good enough. I think you're good enough to do it,’ and that was Patty. So that was pretty cool."

Those words have always stayed with the Floridian, even through her first four,trying years as a pro, when Kerr eschewed a college scholarship after the 1996 Women’s Open for the dream of playing for pay. The words stayed as she lopped 50 pounds off her 5' 4" frame and reduced her body fat from 27.5 percent to 18.5. They stayed as she went on to win her first LPGA Tour event at the Longs Drugs Challenge in 2002, six years after turning pro. And they stayed with her as she went into her 11th professional campaign still seeking that first major after 10 previous top-10s, including a tie for second at the 2000 Women’s Open at The Merit Club outside of Chicago.

But Kerr had a premonition about Pine Needles. This was hallowed ground and a place that felt like a second home. Years before, she mentioned to people that her first Women’s Open title would come either at Pine Needles or Interlachen. Good friend Kelli Kuehne, a three-time USGA champion and a 1996 USA Curtis Cup teammate, told Kerr on the Pine Needles practice green during one of the ubiquitous rain delays that this was going to be her week to shine.

Her clairvoyance looked to be spot-on after a third-round 5-under-par 66 put Kerr in the final grouping with Lorena Ochoa and reigning Kraft Nabisco champion Morgan Pressel, like Kerr a south Floridian who nearly won the Open as an amateur, in 2005 at Cherry Hills Country Club.

Never forgetting Berg’s words, Kerr donned red, white and blue attire for Sunday’s final round. With her wardrobe decided, Kerr then set out to take the one title she had wanted since first wielding a club as an eight-year-old.

Always a grinder and tenacious battler, Kerr stared down Ochoa, who also was seeking a first major at the time, and played bogey-free golf on the second nine, thus ending all the doubt about her ability to handle major-championship pressure.

"If anyone had said to me when she was little and playing, ‘Do you think she’d ever [win a Women’s Open],’ I would have said, ‘Absolutely,’ " Kerr’s mother, Linda, told the Miami Herald. "We love that area of the world (Sandhills region of North Carolina), and she loves that golf course. She stepped out there and it was magic."

Added McLean, the world-renowned instructor who has mentored Kerr since she was 19: "From the first time [we met], you knew this girl wanted to be a great player. I told a writer friend I thought she was going to win. It’s easy to say afterward, but I really thought she was going to win."

A few days later, Kerr celebrated at a swank New York restaurant with 70 of her closest friends. New York Rangers general manager Glenn Sather bought champagne and everyone drank out of the Women’s Open trophy, including Golf for Women editor Susan Reid. People who weren’t even part of Kerr’s group came downstairs to revel in the moment.

Unfortunately, there’s been a lingering hangover. The ultra-competitive Kerr has yet to achieve victory since the Women’s Open and she closed out 2007 with a 72.55 scoring average and only two top-10 efforts – a tie for fourth at the Hana Bank-Kolon Championship and a fourth at the year-ending ADT Championship.

"Every golfer goes through what I’ve been going through," said Kerr. "It tries your patience and it tries your confidence. But you have to realize that it’s just a game and it’s justb little changes that need to be made to get that consistency again."

Regaining That Edge

It’s another chamber-of-commerce April evening in the Coachella Valley, and Kerr, fresh off making the cut at the Kraft Nabisco Championship, the first LPGA major of the year, is headed to one of her favorite Chinese restaurants near the Mission Hills Country Club, in Rancho Mirage, Calif.

A scrumptious meal is topped off with a wafer-like fortune cookie that reveals an important message. The slip of paper reads: "A GOOD DAY AHEAD."

Such prophecies generally are about as reliable as a newborn sleeping an entire night without incident. But this particular morsel seemed prescient, at least for 24 hours. The next day, Kerr shot a 6-under 66 to move into contention and earn a spot in the final group with 54-hole leader Lorena Ochoa. In 2005, Kerr had won the CN Canadian Open by rallying from eight shots back. Now she was in a three-way tie for third, just two strokes behind.

Too bad the cookie didn’t offer a plural form of 'day.' Had she returned to the restaurant for another cookie, it might have said, "YOU ARE ABOUT TO GET WET." Kerr’s good play, unfortunately, had a 24-hour window as she carded an uncharacteristic 80 on Sunday to tie for 21st. She put two balls in the water at the fifth hole – a cost of $8,057.50 per splash – and wound up 13 strokes behind Ochoa, who had a championship-clinching 67.

In 2008, this has been an all-too-familiar pattern for Kerr. One round seems to get in the way of winning.

At the recent, rain-shortened Sybase Classic in Clifton, N.J., Kerr book-ended sub-70 rounds (69-68) with a second-round 76. At the Safeway International in Phoenix, she posted a second-round 64, but rounds of 74-73-71 landed her in a tie for 29th. At the season-opening SBS Open at Turtle Bay in Hawaii, she opened with back-to-back 69s, but a final-round 72 left her in a tie for eighth. Her only other top 10 came at the Stanford International Pro-Am in her hometown of Miami, where she shot 69-72-67-72 to tie for sixth.

"It’s something we’re working hard on," said caddie Jeff King, who replaced Jason Gilroyed, who was on her bag for the Women’s Open. "It’s a matter of staying patient."

Added Kerr: "I’ve been playing some really good golf this year. I think it’s better than last year. I’ve just had that one little hiccup round where my focus isn’t the same and I just can’t produce the results. And it takes me out of contention to finish in the top 10 or win the golf tournament. I’ve been in contention three times this year and I’ve only finished sixth and eighth from those results.

"I feel like I am on the brink of doing really, really well."

At the end of 2007, Kerr worked hard to fix small mechanical areas of her swing. And early in 2008, she needed to refine some parts of her short game. With those things remedied, now she’s focused on the mental side.

Perhaps it will all come to fruition at Interlachen, which will play as the longest course in Women’s Open history (6,789 yards, par 73), with five par-5 holes.

"It’s like winning 10 golf tournaments," said Kerr of the energy expended to win this major. "It’s not like winning just one. You don’t really understand that or fathom that until you do win.

"I think my game is suited for [majors] because the golf courses are generally tough and long. And I am a grinder. You get rewarded for [making pars] in a U.S. Open. In other tournaments you don’t because it’s a birdie fest. So I like the toughness of the format and the course set-up, because I know my game stands up to that."

Bringing Out The Personality

Peel away the layers and one sees a different Cristie Kerr. It’s not the tempermental individual often portrayed by the media.

You see a kind, caring, highly thoughtful and articulate person, one who spends a lot of time doing charitable work for breast cancer.

Much of Kerr’s transformation can be traced to July 2003, when her mom faced a diagnosis of breast cancer. That’s when Kerr had an epiphany. She realized it was time to shed some of the selfishness that she had been – fairly or unfairly – branded with since her junior days. Some LPGA Tour players thought she was a bit immature, which is the case with many adolescents as they morph into adulthood. With Kerr turning down a plethora of college scholarships – Stanford, Arizona State, Tulsa, Duke, Pepperdine, etc. all recruited the 4.3 GPA student – she was entering a professional world without the benefit of the four-year learning curve that higher education often provides.

Kerr, who competed on the boys team at Sunset High, had always traveled around the country with her parents – mainly her father, Michael – and that didn’t change in those fledgling LPGA Tour days. Her previously insulated world was now expanding and there were growing pains, on and off the course. This was no longer junior golf, where she had been named the 1995 American Junior Golf Association Player of the Year, or amateur golf, where she was the youngest member picked to play on the 1996 USA Curtis Cup team in Ireland. Now she was just another hotshot in the ever-growing talent pool.

At the time, only seven junior stars had eschewed college for the professional ranks, the first being Marlene Hagge in 1950 when she helped establish the LPGA. Laura Baugh, who won the U.S. Women’s Amateur at 16, also did it, but she never won a professional tournament and endured her own personal battles. Another Floridian, Michelle McGann, the 1987 U.S. Girls’ Junior champion, also made the leap. She went winless her first six years on tour, but now owns seven victories, the last coming at the 1997 ShopRite Classic.

"When I went out, it was like, ‘Geez, I’m out here with Pat [Bradley] and Joanne [Carner],’ " McGann told The Associated Press in 1997. "These girls, it’s like you should know who they are. They just come out and have no fear. They have so much confidence."

Today, young phenoms have no fear playing in the big leagues and it’s a growing trend for the elite juniors to go for LPGA Tour cards out of high school. Players such as 2004 Curtis Cupper Paula Creamer, 2005 U.S. Women’s Amateur champion Morgan Pressel, 2004 Girls’ Junior winner Julieta Granada, 2002 Girls’ Junior champion In-Bee Park and Angela Park are having immediate success. Michelle Wie, the 2003 Women’s Amateur Public Links champion, also turned pro at 16, but has yet to pursue her LPGA Tour card.

Mike and Cristie Kerr were a constant presence on tour after she earned her LPGA privileges for the 1997 season. And Kerr always knew dad was around. At one event, the elder Kerr said, "You almost hit me with that drive," as Cristie approached an errant shot behind a tree at the 18th hole. "I was trying to knock you out," Cristie said with a laugh.

Slowly, Kerr began to pull away from her parents. She got on a vigorous workout routine to remake her body. Her diet changed ,as well. Fast food was replaced by healthier cuisine.

Early close calls finally turned into her first victory in 2002. Two years later, she won three times and now she owns 10 career wins.

But when the news broke about her mom’s breast cancer, everything changed in Kerr’s life. Since then, Kerr started the Birdies for Breast Cancer charity and has raised more than $450,000. She personally donates $50 for every birdie and has invested $25,000 annually to run the Web site. Fellow LPGA Tour players Natalie Gulbis, Kuehne, Pressel, Leta Lindley, McGann and the now-retired Emilee Klein have helped support charity golf tournaments.

"That [diagnosis] changed me a lot," said Kerr. "I realized that golf is not the most important thing. It made me realize life is really precious and you have to value it. You have to do things to help others. It made me a lot less selfish as a person in a sense that I give time to go to breast cancer outings and I give time to go to appearances and things. Before it was kind of everything about me. It still is to a certain degree, but now I have a thing to focus on and I get other people involved in it."

Linda Kerr’s breast cancer is, thankfully, in remission, but Kerr continues to press on with her charity work. She would like to form a Birdies for Cancer team in the fashion of the Pink Ladies, a group popularized in the musical "Grease." She also would like to see an LPGA tournament that benefits the Susan G. Komen Foundation, the national organization that works to fight breast cancer. It is also the national charity for the LPGA Tour and Kerr won the 2006 Komen Award for her philanthropic endeavors.

"I think that would be really cool," said Kerr, of having a special LPGA Tour event to honor the Komen Foundation.

Kerr has also turned into something of a wine connoisseur. She has some 1,200 bottles in her wine cellar and has become friends with several vineyard owners in California. She makes an annual trek to Napa Valley to taste and learn more about wine. Who knows, she could someday follow former PGA Tour players Greg Norman and David Frost with her own wine label.

"I don’t necessarily want my name on it," she said. "I just want to be associated with making it. We’re still trying to figure all that out."

After winning the Women’s Open, Kerr celebrated with her husband, Erik – they married last year with Gulbis and Kuehne serving as bridesmaids – with a 2004 bottle of Artemis (Stag’s Leap), a cabernet blend that "was very good wine."

If she repeats at Interlachen, there's no telling what kind of bottle she may uncork.

David Shefter is a USGA staff writer. E-mail him with questions or comments at dshefter@usga.org.