American women’s golf star Lexi Thompson to retire at age 29

Lexi Thompson (Keith Allison, Wikimedia Commons)

According to Kate Kindelan of ABC News on Wednesday, LPGA star Lexi Thompson of Coral Springs, Florida is planning to retire from women’s golf at the end of the 2024 season. The announcement is a bit of a surprise because Thompson is still in the prime of her career at age 29.

Thompson is the second golfer to announce her retirement in 2024. She follows So-Yeon Ryu of Seoul, South Korea, the 2011 United States Women’s Open and the 2017 ANA Inspiration champion, who retired at the age of 33 on March 21. The difference in the retirement announcements was the fact that Ryu retired right away, while Thompson will continue for the rest of the season.

Thompson has won one major championship in her career. That was the 2014 Kraft Nabisco Championship in Rancho Mirage, California where she shot a four round score of -14, and beat 2014 United States Women’s Open champion Michelle Wie West by three strokes. Wie West made golf headlines two weeks ago when she announced her second pregnancy. The gender of the child is a boy. Wie West gave birth to daughter Makenna Kamalei Yoona in 2020.

In all, Thompson has won 11 LPGA tournaments. However, it should be noted she has not been in the winner’s circle since 2019.

One major reason for Thompson’s retirement has been some mental health struggles. According to James Colgan of golf.com, she was dealing with a degree of loneliness along the way.

The 2024 United States Women’s Open gets underway on Thursday from Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Thompson begins the tournament in the same threesome as Rose Zhang of Arcadia, California and two-time major champion Minjee Lee of Perth, Australia. Lee won the 2021 Evian Championship and 2022 United States Women’s Open.