Another LPGA champion announces surprise retirement

It’s been a year of surprise goodbyes on the LPGA Tour.

First there was Lexi Thompson, one of the game’s true superstars, announcing her retirement from a full-time playing schedule aged 29.

And then Ally Ewing, Thompson’s 32-year-old Solheim Cup teammate, decided she too was walking away just after the United States secured victory over Europe during this year’s match in Virginia.

The duo’s denouement came at the CME Group Tour Championship, the $11milion LPGA season-finale at Tiburon Golf Club in Florida.

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Heading into that week, it was well known Thompson and Ewing were due a send off.

That was not the case for Marina Alex, who, but for a large group of family and friends she had invited down for the final event, kept quiet that she was calling time on her career.

Alex, 34, first played on the LPGA Tour in 2013 and amassed $5million in total career earnings.

Highlights include winning the Portland Classic in 2018 and the Palos Verdes Championship in 2022, as well as being a losing member of the 2019 US Solheim Cup team.

She posted a six-under 66 in her final competitive round to finish tied 12th, enough for a cheque of $94,000.

“It’s always hard to say goodbye,” Alex said. “I know this is what I want, and it’s the right decision for me right now.

“That doesn’t change the fact that this is a life that I built for the last 11 years out here, and golf has been my life since I’ve been a kid. We’re about to enter a new world of a new identity. It’s great, but change is never easy.

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“I’m proud of sticking it out probably maybe a little bit longer than I mentally wanted to if I’m being honest. I was really down in the dumps at the end of last year, and I almost contemplated not coming back. I wanted to come back because it’s really odd.

“There is one triggering moment. It’s not triggering in a bad way. Just the moment when Suzann (Pettersen) retired at Solheim. I was on the opposite side of that. I thought that was one of the most incredible things I’ve seen from a player.

“I always wanted, in some fashion, that for myself. You never are going to get that fairytale experience, win, walk away. But I’m so happy for the last month of golf. Golf doesn’t owe you anything. To be able to at least get a little bit of feeling like it’s the best golf I’ve ever played, and I’m leaving with that, I’m really thankful for it.”

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Alex doesn’t know exactly what the future holds just yet, but does know that it won’t be dictated by what she does on a golf course.

“Right now, I’m just really ready to rest my brain and mostly my heart,” she added. “This is a hard job emotionally, and I’m finally ready to hang that up and not live and die by the golf course. I’m really looking forward to that.”

Other notable players to retire from women’s golf this year include Brittany Lincicome, Angela Stanford, Amy Olson, So Yeon Ru and Catriona Matthew.

Ben Parsons joined bunkered as a Content Producer in 2023 and is the man to come to for all of the latest news, across both the professional and amateur games. Formerly of The Mirror and Press Association, he is a member at Halifax Golf Club and is a long-suffering fan of both Manchester United and the Wales rugby team.