As women’s sport experiences unprecedented growth, the LPGA Tour hopes to follow suit

SINGAPORE – Record Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) viewership driven by Caitlin Clark, attendance highs in English football’s Women’s Super League and the WTA’s tennis events boasting a global audience of 1.1 billion.

Women’s sport has experienced unprecedented growth in recent years and shows no signs of slowing down as interest increases.

Professional services firm Deloitte predicted global revenues of US$1.28 billion (S$1.73 billion) for women’s elite sport in 2024, the first time the figure surpassed US$1 billion.

In golf, the LPGA Tour, which is celebrating its 75th anniversary in 2025, aims to capitalise on the popularity of women’s sport, having made progress over the years.

Players that The Sunday Times spoke with at the HSBC Women’s World Championship this week believe that the organisation is riding on the trend, citing improvements such as larger prize purses and initiatives that benefit players.

New Zealand’s Olympic champion Lydia Ko, 27, said: “It’s a very exciting time for women’s sport, and hopefully we can capitalise on that kind of momentum, a trend that we are going in, and I do feel like we are moving in that direction.

“We have a great leadership team that is going to carry us that way and I hope that’s going to be the case for not only while I’m playing but the generations that are coming ahead.”

The three-time Major champion pointed out that players are now playing for more money. Golfers on the tour compete for a record fund of about US$130 million, compared to US$118 million the year before and over twice the US$61.6 million on offer a decade ago.

Excluding Majors, the 2025 schedule has 11 events with a purse of at least US$3 million, up from only two in 2022.

This season, 24 events will also offer travel stipends, free accommodation for players or guaranteed payouts, perks that will benefit lower-ranked players or those who miss the cut.

From having physiotherapists to tournaments offering free hotels, such support takes a significant load off players’ shoulders, said American Lauren Coughlin.

The world No. 16 said: “It helps us cut our expenses, make a good living and allows us to put up good entertainment for fans.”

Former world No. 1 Feng Shanshan, who retired in 2022, believes the standard of the tour has improved since her playing days, thanks to technology that has made equipment better and training more efficient.

Her average driving distance of 261.05 yards placed her 14th in the series in her rookie season in 2008, but would not put her in the top 50 this year.

Having new faces and a diverse field of athletes also show how the circuit has developed, said Feng, the first Chinese player to earn an LPGA Tour card.

There are at least 10 golfers from China on the LPGA Tour now, including world No. 4 Yin Ruoning and Olympic bronze medallist Lin Xiyu.

“Everything is telling us that the LPGA Tour is getting greater,” said Feng on the sidelines of the 2025 HSBC Women’s World Championship Junior Clinic.

“If the tour is getting better, it’s going to attract more fans and also more sponsors to join the sport.”

According to a report by global sports and entertainment intelligence platform SponsorUnited, the number of sponsorship deals in women’s professional sport has increased more than 22 per cent year on year from 2023 to 2024, with the LPGA leading all women’s sports with 1,100 sponsorship deals.

Matt Chmura, the LPGA’s chief marketing, communications and brand officer, underlined the organisation’s commitment to “creating a lasting future for the women’s game”, pointing to the historic prize funds and how the tour’s media consumption numbers averaged 11 million engagements in 2024.

The LPGA’s efforts are not just focused on the professional game – in the past year, it launched the One Million More Girls campaign to raise funds directed at providing resources to remove barriers of participation for girls and young women.  

Chmura said: “We are excited to see overall record interest in women’s sport globally, and as we look towards the next 75 years of the LPGA, our goal is to creatively rise to the occasion to give our world-class athletes and foundation efforts the coverage and support they deserve.”

Having been on the LPGA Tour since 2012, Spain’s world No. 39 Carlota Ciganda, 34, agrees things have become better and hopes to see sponsorship and monetary rewards grow even more.

Like many other sports, there remains a disparity between the men and women’s games.

While the total prize fund of US$131 million for the 2025 season is an LPGA record, it pales in comparison to the over US$400 million that is on offer on the PGA Tour this year.

Feng, 35, suggested starting with the Majors, just as tennis has done. Since 2007, all four of tennis’ Grand Slams pay men and women equally.

In golf, the 2024 Women’s US Open had the largest purse among all LPGA Majors last season at US$12 million, while the men’s US Open offered US$21.5 million.

Coughlin feels “there’s a long way to go” and hopes the incoming commissioner succeeding Mollie Marcoux Samaan, who left in January, will continue to advance the series.

She stressed the importance of securing better TV contracts. In April 2024, the final round of the Ford Championship, where world No. 1 Nelly Korda was chasing her third consecutive title – in an impressive run that what would eventually stretch to five straight victories – received just 45 minutes of coverage on the Golf Channel. Instead, the network aired the PGA Tour Champions’ Galleri Classic.

Coughlin, 32, said: “Until that happens, it’s hard to put out sponsors for marketing and advertising when they don’t know when we’re going to be on TV or if their tournament is going to be put on TV.

“But I’m hoping that sponsors that we do have are very loyal and good to us and hopefully, we can keep going in the right direction.”