EVANS, Ga. – The initial plan was for Maria Jose Marin to have her father, Jose, on the bag for her fourth start at the Augusta National Women’s Amateur. But she called an audible last week, switching to a local caddie that she had met while playing a practice round at Champions Retreat.
Darren Woo, a 56-year-old father of five boys, has looped at Champions for six years, but he also works full-time as a firefighter for the Savannah River Site Fire Department while volunteering for Columbia County.
After Marin fired a scorching, 7-under 65 in Wednesday’s first round, no firehose was needed.
“We didn’t want to put them out,” Woo said of her clubs, “We wanted to get them started.”
For Marin, the reigning NCAA champion who is coming off her first college win of the season Sunday at the Clemson Invitational, it took her a couple holes. She was hesitant to strike a 15-foot slider for birdie at the par-3 11th, her second hole of the day, worried she might three-putt. But then Woo, who has caddied twice before in this championship, including the first two rounds for Bailey Shoemaker when she was runner-up in 2024, told his player, “Be confident.”
Marin birdied the next hole, and from there, she rattled off six more, including on each of her final two holes. She missed a short birdie at the par-4 seventh before nearly holing her tee shot at the par-3 eighth and then ramming a 20-footer into the flagstick and having it drop on the par-5 ninth.
“I think I can build a really good strategy around this place,” said Marin, who missed last year’s cut after going T-14, T-30 in the previous two ANWAs, “and I think that’s what I did, along with my coach and my dad. We talked about it yesterday a lot, and yeah, they just told me, ‘You know the place, you know what you’re doing, just trust yourself, trust your game, and yeah, just be you.’ … This tournament is the 72 best players in the world, and everyone is good here. Everyone comes with the same objective in mind; it’s to win or to go to Augusta. Yeah, it just means that my game is in a good spot, that I’m doing the right things, and that I’ve got to keep doing what I’m doing.”
Marin’s 65 was matched Wednesday afternoon by Korea’s Soomin Oh, the 10th-ranked amateur in the world. They paced the 72-player field on the lowest scoring day in championship history, 72.22, which bested the previous low of 72.27 from last year’s first round. Three players carded 66 – 17-year-old Asterisk Talley, the reigning runner-up; Texas A&M’s Vanessa Borovilos; and Stanford’s Andrea Revuelta.
Talley, the world No. 9, entered this week having won each of her last three junior tournaments, including her second Junior Invitational at Sage Valley in three years. She most recently wrapped up a T-29 showing at the LPGA’s Ford Championship on Sunday, then took a redeye from Phoenix and to Atlanta, before which Talley’s dad, Jim, a correctional officer, paid $150 for his daughter to get a massage and spend 45 minutes in a massage chair.
Talley, who has not finished worse than T-8 in her two previous starts in this championship, remained loose on Wednesday, holing a bunker shot for eagle at the par-5 18th midway through her bogey-free round.
Not only is Talley much longer, more skilled and disciplined than she was two years ago when she debuted, but she looks the part. In 2024, she showed up wearing golf clothes that Jim had bought on eBay. Now, she’s dressed head to toe in Adidas, one of several sponsors — oh, and with a pineapple ball marker clipped to the brim of her TaylorMade hat, one of about 50 sequenced styles that she owns and constantly rotates.
“She’s more confident, too,” Jim adds, “I can just tell in her walk.”
Jim has witnessed Talley’s maturation firsthand, though from a little further away. It was two Januarys ago that Talley was playing in Annika Sorenstam’s AJGA invitational, and during a Q&A with Sorenstam, the LPGA legend talked about how eventually she kicked her dad to the side and took complete ownership of her game.
“She said, ‘My dad never told me to hit more balls,’” Talley recalled. When Sorenstam uttered those words, Talley and her swing coach, Elliot Busichio, immediately looked at Jim, and Talley went, “No more, One more bucket.”
So, as his daughter fielded a handful of interview questions on Wednesday afternoon, he stood out of earshot against the fence.
“These two years went fast,” he said, “but she’s gained a lot of everything from those two years.”
In total, 31 players are under par entering Thursday’s second round, after which the field will be cut to the top 30 and ties. Among those inside the cut line: world No. 1 Kiara Romero (70), Texas junior Farah O’Keefe (71) and past champion Anna Davis (71) of Auburn.
Those with work to do include top-15 amateurs Aphrodite Deng (72), Catherine Park (72), Rianne Malixi (73), Eila Galitsky (74), Jasmine Koo (74) and reigning U.S. Women’s Amateur champion Megha Ganne, who opened last year in 63 but shot 77 on Wednesday.
Marin was in tears when she missed qualifying for Saturday’s final round last year at Augusta National.
“This tournament means a lot to me,” Marin said. “Not making the cut, it hurt a lot.”
So far this week, she’s leaving the waterworks to the firefighter.