World Junior Golf Championships : Local Players Helping to Raise Expectations to New Levels

LA JOLLA — Leta Lindley of Carlsbad remembers her early years in the Optimist Junior World Golf Championships. Scores that had players in contention then would be disasters for today’s competitors in the girls’ 15-17 division.

So much for progress.

“I was looking through my scrapbooks, and I see these girls who won the 15-17s when I was playing in the lower divisions, and one year, I think someone even won it with (a final round of) 85,” said Lindley, 16, after she finished her second round Wednesday at Torrey Pines North.

“That would never happen now,” she said. “You have to have a 75 or under just to be in contention. That’s how good we’ve gotten here.”

Lindley is one of a number of San Diego juniors, girls playing in the 15-17s, who are making their presence known in this tournament.

Some nationally recognized junior girls call San Diego home.

“We have Christy Erb and Elizabeth Bowman,” said Lindley, who is no stranger to winning herself. Lindley won the 11-12 division of the Junior World in 1984 and was third in 13-14s in 1986. “I don’t need to go anywhere (for competition). I can stay right here.”

Lindley’s second-round 81 was well off her opening of 74, which had tied her for second place. She’s now tied for 14th.

“Chipping is what killed me,” she said. “I mean, I got on the greens, but how many times can you sink 10-footers for par?”

Lindley, a senior at Carlsbad High School who played in the seventh spot on Carlsbad’s boys’ state championship team this year, said she had been looking forward to the 18th hole.

“I was just trying to hang in there because I was having a bad day,” she said.

But she said she’s sure her luck will improve. “In a four-day tournament, you’re bound to have a bad day, so at least I got mine out of the way.”

Going into today’s third round and the cut for the final day, Bonita’s Erb, who is third, and Bowman, who is tied for fourth, hope the bad day never appears.

Though she is only two shots behind the leaders, Erb, winner of the 1981 10-under Junior World and second in her divisions in 1985 and 1986, found little favor in her back-to-back 75s.

“Both today and yesterday I should have done better,” said Erb, 17, who will play golf at UCLA this fall.

“I should be shooting better, and I’m not putting as well as I should be.”

She hopes that in today’s third round she will “come out and concentrate a little more, stay in tune and shoot better, and shooting better means I’ll be putting better.”

Bowman, 17, who will be a senior at Bonita High School, has never saved her best golf for the Junior World. She was the state junior girls’ champion last year and was runner-up in the same competition last week.

‘I’ve never really done anything special here,” she said. “I’ve always missed the cut.”

But she said she enjoys having this world-class event in familiar territory.

“It’s kind of neat because you know all the people, and they’re behind you,” she said. “When you play other places, they want to see good golf, but they don’t really get behind you.”

Bowman played badly on the first five holes of the second round--”the people watching must have thought I was a real hack,” she said--but rebounded and shot par 74.

She agrees that four days is a lot of time for a winner to emerge, and she still may have a chance.

“In four days, there’s a lot of holes to play,” she said. “Someone can really come out and surprise you, you just never know. . . . And there are always miracles.”

Golf Notes

There was another hole-in-one in the boys’ 11-12 division at Mission Bay Golf Course. Luis Baca of El Paso, Tex., used a 5-iron to ace the 135-yard 15th hole. . . . Lisa Kiggens of Bakersfield and Christine Drabble of American Samoa are tied at 148 for first in the girls’ 15-17 division. . . . At Torrey Pines South, Clinton Whitelaw of South Africa remains in first in boys’ 15-17 with a 138 total. Four shots behind him is Ramon Brobio of the Philippines. San Diego’s top entrant in the division is Kevin Riley with a 152.