Yani Tseng (曾雅妮) said yesterday that she gave the NT$2 million (US$69,000) she won in prize money for capturing this year’s Taifong Ladies Open to her mother, who fulfilled a wish by serving as Tseng’s caddy on the tournament’s final day on Sunday.
The 21-year-old golfer said that after she finished Saturday’s second round in fourth place, her mother asked to caddy for her on the final day of the event, but had one condition: If Tseng won, her mother would claim the first-place prize money.
“At that time, I was still trailing and didn’t think I could win,” Tseng said, but she later admitted that she may have made the commitment too hastily.
Tseng won the tournament after rallying for a 4-under-par 68 on the final day to defeat Nam Min-ji of South Korea by three shots.
She had finished the opening round in 34th place after shooting a 77, but improved to a 73 on Saturday to move up 30 places on the leaderboard.
Tseng said her mother had always wanted to caddy for her, but the wish was not realized until Sunday, and it came with a surprisingly healthy payday.
“This is absolutely an exception,” Tseng said of the deal with her mother.
Professional golfers usually pay their caddies roughly 10 percent of their winnings.
The young golfer attributed her success over the past year to a change in attitude and approach. She said that after becoming a professional golfer, her main goal was to become the world’s top golfer, but her emphasis on scoring led to inconsistent results.
Advice from one of the sport’s greats, Annika Sorenstam — to not just think of winning but focus on the process — helped improve her mindset and brought greater consistency to her game, Tseng said.
“Regardless of whether it’s the 10th hole or the 18th, I have to concentrate on each one equally,” she said.
The new attitude helped her capture three LPGA titles, including two majors — the Kraft Nabisco Championship and Women’s British Open — last year, when she was also named the LPGA Player of the Year.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods