Five Hall of Famers, a $1 million purse, and a golf course carved out of old hydropower land along the Huron River — that is what Ann Arbor gets this week when Barton Hills Country Club hosts the U.S. Senior Women's Open from Thursday through Sunday. Annika Sorenstam, a 10-time major champion, headlines a 120-player field that includes fellow World Golf Hall of Fame members Amy Alcott, Juli Inkster, Karrie Webb and Hollis Stacy.
The tournament tees off Thursday and runs through next Sunday, with the field drawn from 15 countries and 44 states, according to The Detroit News. Sorenstam, who won 72 LPGA tournaments and retired from tournament golf in 2008, called the event the biggest tournament they have all year, per the same report. She has returned to the Senior Women's Open every year since 2021, finishing in the top 10 each time and in the top five on three occasions.
A Reunion Feel on a Donald Ross Classic
Players have described this week's atmosphere as more like a reunion than a major championship buildup, the Detroit News reports. That sense of nostalgia is amplified by the venue itself: Barton Hills Country Club was designed by legendary architect Donald Ross and opened in 1922, after golf course architect Ron Pritchard led a 2012 restoration aimed at returning the layout to its original architectural roots, according to the USGA. The course plays 6,237 yards to a par of 72, and this marks the club's third USGA championship, following the 1998 U.S. Women's Amateur, won by Grace Park, and the 2008 U.S. Women's Mid-Amateur, won by Joan Higgins.
Only four players in this year's field competed in both of those earlier Barton Hills events, per the USGA. Michigan State women's golf coach Stacy Slobodnik-Stoll is among the rare few who have competed in all three USGA championships held at the club, spanning nearly three decades of the venue's history.
The Course's Deeper Roots
The club's origins trace back even further than its first USGA event. Barton Hills was conceived in 1919 on excess hydropower land along the Huron River that was acquired by Detroit Edison president Alex Dow, who then hired the renowned Olmsted Brothers firm to design the surrounding residential enclave, according to the Ann Arbor District Library. The initial nine holes opened that same year before Ross expanded the layout to a full 18 holes in 1922, giving the club the bones of the course competitors will face this week just five miles north of the University of Michigan campus.
Karrie Webb and the Weight of a U.S. Open Feel
Karrie Webb, who won back-to-back U.S. Opens in 2000 and 2001 and has 41 LPGA titles among her seven major championships, said the event has a U.S. Open feel, the Detroit News reports. That comparison carries extra weight given how rare it is to win both national titles: only Laura Davies, who won the 1987 U.S. Women's Open and the 2018 U.S. Senior Women's Open, and Sorenstam, who won the U.S. Women's Open in 1995, 1996 and 2006 before adding the senior title in 2021, have ever managed the double, according to Precision Over Power. Both Hall of Famers are in the Ann Arbor field this week.
Defending champion Becky Morgan, who won the 2025 title by six shots over Juli Inkster, returns to defend, joining a group of past champions in the field that also includes Helen Alfredsson, Sorenstam, Trish Johnson and Leta Lindley. Inkster, 66, arrives off a tie for 12th at the LPGA Dow Championship in Midland in June, a result that came just weeks before her Portland tune-up ahead of this major, as Hoodline noted in its coverage of the LPGA's only Pacific Northwest stop.
Format, Field and What's on the Line
The 120-player field will compete across 72 holes of stroke play over four days, with a 36-hole cut trimming the field to the lowest 50 scorers and ties after Friday's second round, according to the USGA's official fact sheet. Any players tied after 72 holes will settle the championship in a two-hole aggregate playoff. Under USGA eligibility rules, the Senior Women's Open is open to any female professional or amateur who is at least 50 years old on or before the first day of competition, with amateurs required to carry a Handicap Index of 7.4 or lower; this year's field was compiled from 388 original entries across 16 nationwide qualifying sites.
The stakes extend well beyond the trophy. The winner takes home $180,000 from the tournament's $1 million purse, along with a 10-year exemption into future U.S. Senior Women's Opens and, notably, a spot in the 2027 U.S. Women's Open field at Inverness Club in Toledo, Ohio — a rare bridge back into top-tier women's major golf for a senior champion. Sorenstam said the tournament has been a motivator for her and many other women, and added that with 120 players in the field, everyone is excited to play and compete, per the Detroit News.
Michigan's Bigger Major Moment
This week's championship also marks the 35th USGA national championship conducted in Michigan and the state's first since 2024, underscoring the state's long history as a national championship host. The tournament arrives amid a broader wave of USGA business in Southeast Michigan: nearby Oakland Hills Country Club in Bloomfield Township was awarded eight future USGA championships spanning 2024 to 2051, including the 2031 and 2042 U.S. Women's Opens and the 2034 and 2051 U.S. Opens, after hosting the 2024 U.S. Junior Amateur and rebuilding its clubhouse following a 2022 fire, as Hoodline previously reported in its piece on Oakland Hills' clubhouse comeback.
The Senior Women's Open itself is a relatively young championship, launched by the USGA in 2018, 38 years after the men's U.S. Senior Open debuted in 1980. Seven distinct champions have claimed the trophy across its first seven playings, from Laura Davies in the inaugural year to Becky Morgan last year. Coverage of this week's rounds airs on Golf Channel, with live streaming from 4 to 7 p.m. and tape-delay coverage running from 10 a.m. to midnight, plus broadcast windows Saturday and Sunday; tickets for spectators start at $33.
