Michelle Sung Wie American professional golfer Date of Birth: 11.10.1989 Country: USA

1. Biography of Michelle Wie
2. Early Life and Family
3. Education and Golf Career

Biography of Michelle Wie

Michelle Sung Wie, an American professional golfer, became a professional athlete shortly before her 16th birthday, which was accompanied by a huge amount of publicity. Standing at 185 cm tall, she is quite unusual for a Korean. She competes in the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA).

Early Life and Family

Michelle Sung Wie was born on October 11, 1989, in Honolulu, Hawaii. Her parents were immigrants from South Korea who arrived in the United States in the 1980s. Her father taught transportation management at the University of Hawaii, while her mother was the women's amateur golf champion of South Korea in 1985 and competed in the Miss Korea pageant. When Michelle was born, she obtained dual citizenship as both her parents were Korean. However, since the Republic of Korea does not allow dual citizenship after the age of 21, Wie chose to become a citizen of the United States.

Education and Golf Career

In June 2007, Wie graduated from Punahou School in Honolulu, the same school attended by Barack Obama from 1971 to 1979. On December 19, 2006, she announced that she would be attending Stanford University, a school with strong family ties. Her paternal grandfather was an invited professor, and both her aunt and uncle are Stanford graduates. In September 2007, Michelle became a freshman at Stanford but was unable to play for the university team due to being a professional golfer.

During her first three years at Stanford, Wie only attended classes in the fall and winter, from late September to mid-March each year, and took breaks to participate in professional tournaments. Wie began playing golf at the age of four. In 2000, at the age of ten, she became the youngest player ever to qualify for the Women's U.S. Amateur Public Links Championship. Eight years later, her record was broken by another Hawaiian golfer, Allisen Corpuz, who qualified at five months younger than Wie.

In 2001, an 11-year-old Wie won two competitions, the Hawaii State Women's Stroke Play Championship and the Jennie K. Wilson Women's Invitational, the oldest and most prestigious women's amateur tournament in Hawaii. In 2002, she won the Hawaii State Open Women's Division by thirteen strokes and became the youngest player to qualify for an LPGA Tour event, the Takefuji Classic, held in Hawaii. This record stood until 2007.

In 2003, at the Kraft Nabisco Championship, Wie became the youngest qualifier in LPGA history, and in June 2003, she won the Women's Amateur Public Links, setting another age record. On October 5, 2005, a week before her 16th birthday, Wie announced her decision to turn professional. She signed endorsement deals with Nike and Sony, which bring her over 10 million dollars a year. Since then, her best results have been a second-place finish at the LPGA Championship and a third-place finish at the Women's British Open in 2005, as well as third-place finishes at the U.S. Women's Open and Kraft Nabisco Championship in 2006.

Due to her tall stature, Michelle Wie often competes in tournaments against men.