More Than Half A Century After Catherine Lacoste Won The US Women’s Open, An Amateur May Win It Again

Posted on December 12, 2020 by JFP

The last amateur to win the US Women’s open was Rene Lacoste’s daughter Cathering Lacoste in 1967. Now, there’s a chance that an amateur may win the 2020 US Women’s Open again.

It has been 53 years since an amateur has won the U.S. Women’s Open. That could change this weekend.

More than half a century after Catherine Lacoste of France won in 1967 at The Homestead, two amateurs, Linn Grant and Kaitlyn Papp, sit within five-strokes of the 36-hole lead.

Grant, who also contended at the 2018 U.S. Women’s Open at Shoal Creek but faded to a T-57 on the weekend, sits solo second after back-to-back rounds of 69. She’s at 4 under par. Papp, a Texas native enjoying a trip around her home state, sits T-3 with rounds of 71-68.

New York Times Has A Story On The “Four Musketeers”

Posted on November 1, 2020 by JFP

The New York Times has an article on the four French tennis players known as the “Four Musketeers” of whom the most famous is René Lacoste:

When Rafael Nadal won his 13th French Open this month, he donned a neon-pink face mask and kissed the trophy, known as La Coupe des Mousquetaires. He then removed his mask and bit the handle.

The trophy is an homage to Jean Borotra, Jacques Brugnon, Henri Cochet and René Lacoste, known as the Four Musketeers, the revered Frenchmen who put their nation on the tennis map in the 1920s and ’30s.

French Fashion Houses FusalP and Chloe Collaborate On New Ski Wear Collection

Posted on October 20, 2020 by JFP

Fusalp, the French fashion house, owned since 2013 by Lacoste heirs Sophie and Phillipe Lacoste, is collaborating with the equally venerable Chloe on a ski wear collection. Fusalp has already been dubbed one of the “seven chicest skiwear brands” by L’Officiel and this collaboration can only add to their reputation. Here’s more detail, courtesy of WWD:

Chloé and Fusalp have teamed on a skiwear capsule collection, with co-branded technical outerwear, knitwear and accessories designed with an eye to the slopes as well as urban settings.

It’s the first time the two French labels, both founded in the early Fifties, have worked together. The collection will be sold on Net-a-porter first, and then, starting in November, on the web sites of both brands.

The pieces on offer include a quilted puffer jacket, high-waisted flared pants, a branded helmet and a ski suit.

Backed by a group of “high-profile, French investors,” Fusalp has grown to fifty stores, and claims its 2020 sales will be thirty million Euros.

More coverage of the collaboration can be found at MFFashion who report that the line includes “padded jackets, coats, shoes, tight pants, ski suits and thick sweaters.” Additional coverage can be found at Numero, and at Madame Figaro who write that Fusalp’s competition jackets are at the “cutting edge of the genre.”

Chicago Sun Times Profiles Catherine Lacoste, the only amateur winner of the U.S. Women’s Open

Posted on June 20, 2020 by JFP

The Chicago Sun Times has published a detailed profile of Catherine Lacoste, daughter of Rene Lacoste, and the only amateur winner of the U.S Women’s Open. In the piece, they note that “Lacoste came by the athletic ability honestly as the daughter of Rene Lacoste and Simone Thione de la Chaume, who won the 1927 British Ladies Amateur. She recalls being a 24-handicap as a 13-year-old, but her improvement after that was marked.”

When Lacoste came to play in 1967:

She “never thought in any way” that she would win the tournament that week, but someone else did.

“I think the only person who thought I might win the U.S. Open was my father because he’d won the U.S. Open in tennis and obviously he had the spirit to think, ‘Why can’t she do it in golf?”

Lacoste returned to the U.S. in 1968 to defend her Women’s Open title but finished 13th, 13 shots back. More impressive over the following year was her sheer dominance in women’s amateur golf. She was focused on getting better at match play by then, and from October 1968 to October 1969, she never lost a single match. Victories piled up, including at the Women’s Western Amateur, U.S. Women’s Amateur and British Ladies Amateur.

Read more of the profile at The Chicago Times.