A Star is Born

After winning the HWIO Aditi Ashok has the weight of performance to back up her precocious talent which has been the talk of the golfing fraternity for a while now.

- V. Krishnaswamy

SHE IS slowly getting used to all the attention. It does get a bit too much at times, but Aditi Ashok, 18, is learning to live and cope with it. Minutes after rewriting a few pages in Indian women’s golf history by winning the Hero Women’s Indian Open (HWIO), she went through her media duties—the photos, the autographs, the interviews and more. Then she suddenly remembered she was hungry.

As she headed to the dining area where the buffet was laid, her colleagues on the LET from various countries stood up and started chanting “Aditi...Aditi... Aditi...” and clapped. The youngster almost stopped in her tracks. That’s when it hit her for the first time that she had achieved something special. More accolades would pour in over the next few days.

Shy, but witty, it is not often that Aditi is stuck for words, but she could not help uttering, “Oh, my God.” She smiled and went headlong into a sea of handshakes, hugs and selfies with her colleagues on the Tour. The 34-year-old Beth Allen, an American now settled in Edinburgh, who is also a kidney donor and a two-time winner this season and a legend in her own right, rushed forward for a big hug, making for a great picture—that of the leader on the LET Order of Merit with the leader in the Race for the Rookie of the Year.

Aditi has arrived, broken the glass ceiling of Indian women’s golf and become an international star. She is much adored on the LET. One of the ‘babies’ on the Tour, she has risen above her age to become one of the most noticed and followed golfers on the Tour. The Tour could not be happier; as Ivan Khodabakhsh, CEO, LET, says, “It is so good to see Aditi win. We all knew she had it, but to do it at such a young age is fantastic. She will be great for Indian golf and for the Tour.” The theme was recurring and consistent.