Mao Saigo has won the 2024 Louise Suggs Rolex Rookie of the Year Award, whilst Ayaka Furue earnt Vare Trophy honours after the completion of the CME Group Tour Championship
The LPGA Tour announced that Mao Saigo has earned the 2024 Louise Suggs Rolex Rookie of the Year award and Ayaka Furue the Vare Trophy following the final round of the LPGA’s season-ending event, the CME Group Tour Championship. Both players received their respective awards during Sunday’s trophy ceremony on the 18th green at Tiburón Golf Club.
Going into the final event of the season, only Republic of Korea’s Jin Hee Im and Japan’s Mao Saigo were still in contention for the Rookie of the Year award, with Saigo ahead of Im by 66 points. Im had to finish fourth or better this week in Naples to have a chance to win the award and ultimately finished T42.
Saigo is the second Japanese player to win the award since it was first created and is proceeded only by Hiromi Kobayashi, who claimed the award in 1990, almost 35 years ago.
The key to Saigo’s banner season was consistency throughout 2024. Making 29 starts during the 2024 LPGA Tour season, she recorded a total of seven top-10 finishes including T7 results at two Major championships, the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship and the AIG Women’s Open. She also earned two runner-up finishes at the CPKC Women’s Open and the Buick LPGA Shanghai, and missed just five cuts in her first season on Tour. She finished this year ranked ninth in the Race to the CME Globe, the highest ranked player on the Points List without a win in 2024.
Saigo began her first year on the LPGA Tour in 2024 after finishing tied for second at the 2023 Final Qualifying (formerly named LPGA Q-Series) to earn Membership for this season. Before her rookie season, she had competed in each major championship at least once: U.S. Women’s Open presented by Ally (2022, 2023), KPMG Women’s PGA Championship (2022, 2023), AIG Women’s Open (2022, 2023), Amundi Evian Championship (2023) and The Chevron Championship (2023). Prior to LPGA Tour Membership, she played predominantly on the JLPGA Tour since 2020, winning a total of six times including five wins in 2022.
2024 Vare Trophy - Ayaja Furue
Furue won the 2024 Vare Trophy for recording the season’s lowest scoring average of 69.988 and meeting the award’s minimum requirements. This is the highest scoring average since Danielle Kang finished with 70.082 in 2020. She is the first player from Japan to ever receive the award in its 72-year history.
Entering the CME Group Tour Championship, the Vare Trophy was down to two players: Haeran Ryu, with a scoring average of 69.98, and Ayaka Furue, with a scoring average of 70.05. Following the third round, the duo’s scoring average differed by just 0.000253 strokes, and the award was down to the final round.
Furue’s final-round score of 68 secured her the Trophy and a coveted LPGA Hall of Fame point. Although Jeeno Thitikul and Nelly Korda were in the lead for the award, they did not meet the minimum rounds requirement to be eligible to win.
Making 24 starts this season, Furue had a banner year with 12 top-10 finishes including her second LPGA Tour victory and first major championship win at the Amundi Evian Championship. She opened the 2024 season with back-to-back T4 finishes and only missed the cut at one event this year, the Dow Championship.
Furue became a 2022 LPGA Tour rookie after finishing seventh at 2021 LPGA Final Qualifying (formerly Q-Series) to earn Membership. Since then, she became a Rolex First-Time Winner at the 2022 ISPS Handa Women’s Scottish Open and was a member of Team Japan at the 2023 Hanwha LIFEPLUS International Crown.
Prior to the LPGA Tour, she competed on the JLPGA Tour and won eight times between 2019-2021. Furue was also named the 2020-21 JLPGA Player of the Year.
“I feel the winning the Vare Trophy is such is difficult thing to achieve and I think very happy to have this trophy in my hands right now,” said Furue. “I'm so honored to be the first Japanese player to win this trophy. I'm so honored.”
The Vare Trophy was presented to the LPGA by Betty Jameson in 1952, in honour of the great American player Glenna Collett Vare. Vare Trophy scoring averages are computed on the basis of a Member’s total yearly score in Official Tournaments divided by the number of official rounds she played during a season.
