Switching from one sport to another isn’t a new thing. Such was the case with Gabriela Ruffels, who jumped from tennis to golf after being fatigued with her former sport. Being the daughter of tennis players, it wasn’t an easy decision for Ruffels to quit at the age of 14. Also, the athlete was at the peak of her amateur tennis career at that time.
Despite these reasons, she decided to quit tennis and segue into golf. In her early days of golf, Ruffles’ family supported her, and her brother, who is a professional golfer, provided golf lessons. Added to that, she joined Victoria Golf Club and took lessons.
“My brother, Ryan, was playing golf (he’s a professional golfer now, too), and my mom thought I might enjoy it. I joined Victoria Golf Club and took regular lessons. My brother has answered all of my golf questions from the start. Matches between us are super competitive, and he always tries to get in my head, so he credits himself with making me mentally stronger,” said the golfer in an interview.
In the summers, the now-golfer also participated in amateur events, which had top-tier LPGA phenoms like Allisen Corpuz and Lilia Vu competing alongside her. But her thirst wasn’t met with just event exposure, she wanted a victory. In 2019, Gabriela triumphed at the US Women’s Amateur as the first Australian to do so.
In the following year, Rose Zhang beat Ruffles, who was the defending champion. But that defeat didn’t slow her down. In 2020, she finished under the top 15 in two majors, the Chevron Championship and the US Open, which became her most remembered performance. Then, in 2022, she started playing on the Espon Tour, where she has three wins as of now.
But the sport wasn’t easy on her in the professional sphere and the 24-year-old faced a serious heartache when she missed the LPGA Tour card.
Gabriela Ruffels’ admission about handling professional battles
In the same interview, the tennis star-turned-golfer reflected on the fact that professional golf was different from amateur days. She didn’t have a college coach to guide her, and the golfer mostly traveled to her match location with her mother.
But the real hardship came when she failed to enter the LPGA Q School. In her time of agony, her family stood by her.
“They were all disappointed, but the message was consistent: ‘It’s OK. It will all come together.’”
She took the failure sportingly and moved on to work on her golf skills with a support team.
Following that, in 2023, she won three times and reached the peak on the money list to finally get her LPGA card. After entering LPGA, she made six starts last year and clinched her best finish at the CPKC Women’s Open. In 2024, out of seven tournaments the golfer participated in, her best performance was at the FIR HILLS SERI PAK Championship.
The LPGA phenom has just instigated her professional journey in the tour and it is to see if she can reincarnate her peak amateur days in professional golf as well.
