A refreshed Alexa Pano embarks on 2022
Alexa Pano puts a painful 2021 behind her and seeks out new heights
All Alexa Pano wanted out of last fall’s Q-School Stage II was status. It was all the 17-year-old could ask for, considering the LPGA’s minimum age requirement prevented her from competing until her birthday in August. After opening with steady rounds of 71-70-71, Pano was in position to capitalize on another opportunity. But she was burdened by what appeared to be a head cold and, worse, recovering from a muscle strain in her hip that had her grimacing every time she swung the club in the third round. Somehow, Pano produced a dazzling final-round 67, securing her Epson Tour playing privileges with a top-10 finish.
After the round, her father/caddie Rick handed his daughter the keys to the car for the drive home to Lake Worth Beach, Fla. Armed with a learner’s permit and the desire to prove herself behind the wheel, Alexa had never said no to the chance to drive. But this time she did; she was overcome with exhaustion. A trip to the emergency room revealed Pano was battling pneumonia in both of her lungs, which makes her closing 67 all the more remarkable. She spent the next 10 days in bed.
“I asked her, ‘Would you have played Round 4 if it was tomorrow?’” Rick recalls. “She goes, ‘I wouldn’t have told you (I was sick); I would have been playing.”
While fighting one of her toughest battles off the course, Pano displayed a spectacular Stage II finishing kick that signified a turnaround from a difficult year on it as well. Earlier in the year, she had committed to changing her game from top to bottom. “In every event, you could see these mistakes I was making where if I kept repeating them, long term it would become an issue,” Pano says. “So I made the decision to work through and fix them before I got older.”
The transition shook her confidence as she searched for any level of consistency. The elite junior, who has spent the better part of her childhood at the top of the amateur game, became overwhelmingly nervous when teeing it up. The respite came during the 2021 Junior Ryder Cup exhibition, in a relaxed atmosphere among her peers. Teammate Anna Davis was a witness to Pano’s transformation. The two bonded by creating countless TikTok videos. Davis points out the dichotomy in Pano: a laid-back character who has a steely resolve on the course.
As Pano mastered her swing changes, the old confidence slowly returned. “It’s a much better feeling when you’re going to tee it up and you can trust what you’re doing,” she says.
Returning to form, she delivered three consecutive runner-up finishes over the winter amateur slate and then a top 10 at the Epson Tour opener. Past the Sage Valley Junior Invitational, her next elite event is the Augusta National Women’s Amateur in early April. “I’m counting down the days,” Pano says. “I am probably the most excited I’ve ever been for a stretch of golf.”
And with Dad by her side—whom she calls a “legend”—Alexa feels all but unstoppable. His familiarity with her game, along with being a willing participant in all of her foodie post-round journeys, makes him irreplaceable. “How many fathers can say they’re with their daughter 12 hours a day?” he says. “I know her so well, it’s ridiculous.”
The decision of when to turn professional looms as Pano approaches her high school graduation in the next few months. She remains coy about when she’ll turn pro, but either way she will be a fixture on the Epson Tour in the coming months. Pano played her way onto the tour despite pneumonia and a bad hip. She’s ready for anything now.