The Break: The LPGA's next leap

The LPGA starts their first major of the year, The Chevron Championship, at a new venue. Can it gain traction?

Author

Ryan Ballengee
April 23, 2026

Majors season is here for the LPGA

The LPGA kicks off their major season with the first of five majors on the docket, playing this week at Memorial Park Golf Course in Houston, Texas, for The Chevron Championship.

Nelly Korda has already won this year and lost to two total players in 2026 — Hyo Joo Kim in back-to-back weeks and Lauren Coughlin in Las Vegas. She’s back as the clear world No. 1, even if Jeeno Thitikul is still atop the Rolex Women’s World Golf Ranking.

Aside from Kim and Coughlin, Hannah Green can’t seem to lose. She’s won four of five worldwide starts this year — twice on the LPGA and twice in her native Australia’s biggest tournaments.

Minjee Lee is looking to win another major in Texas after last year’s Women’s PGA triumph. Sei Young Kim is back in elite form. Lydia Ko is always a threat.

The competition on the LPGA is better than it has ever been from top to bottom. Still, it feels like the LPGA is struggling to break through and thrive in ways that other women's sports leagues are at the moment.

Leadership is looking to change that. Craig Kessler has made some bold moves as the new commissioner, not even a year into the job. He brought on Chad Coleman to lead the LPGA’s marketing efforts after knocking it out the park with Callaway Golf and then Dude Perfect. There’s way more live TV coverage thanks to FM, a tournament sponsor, for footing the bill. Other sponsors like JM Eagle and Chevron are adding more money to purses, each bumping their respective tournaments’ prize funds by $1 million in surprise announcements in successive weeks.

Yet there are some things that still hurt the LPGA’s visibility. This week, they’re playing a major where the PGA Tour played a pre-Masters tune-up. The Texas footprint is important to Chevron, but there are reports of somewhat minimal event promotion in trying to compete with a tournament there just last month.

The LPGA has a great partnership with Golf Channel, and now FM is making sure events air live with enhanced broadcast features. Still, the LPGA needs to be on network TV more often. The push was made a few years ago, as individual events bought time on CBS to get their events on over-the-air TV. The reality is that is a huge deal. The TV numbers for the PGA Tour on network TV versus cable aren’t even worth comparing. Even for LIV Golf, which has one-tenth of the PGA Tour’s audience on TV, there’s a 10-to-1 viewership difference between being on Fox and FS1.

In the long haul, relevance in sport means having the biggest potential audience connect with your best players as often as you can. The top players are competing often this year, and the events have been fantastic. The tournaments just need to be beamed to more people.

In the meanwhile, you’re in on the secret. The LPGA is fantastic viewing, and it’s well worthy of your support.

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