Eleanor Lee grew up surrounded by golf. Her grandparents were members of the exclusive Claremont Country Club in Oakland, California, and would take Lee and her family to the La Jolla Beach and Tennis Club near San Diego every Thanksgiving to play its nine-hole course. "Most of my golf memories were of being a child running on those golf courses," she tells me.
But Lee, now 30, never took the time to learn how to actually play until a few years ago. Looking for a casual sport to get into in 2021, Lee decided to put her grandmother's golf clubs, which she left for Lee when she died, to good use at a public course in Los Angeles. "It was super intimidating," she remembers.
The next year, Lee moved to Austin and decided to start a golf club for beginners as a way to make friends. She called it Hot Girl Golf — a casual gathering where women, including herself, could gain confidence in the sport. "There's so many things that if you don't learn, you feel so out of place," she says. Since she experienced the fun side of the sport while growing up, she wanted to help more people feel at home on a course.
Lee posted about her first meetup in spring 2022. Eighteen women, some who had never swung a club, turned up at the driving range and hit balls for an hour. The group quickly became a hit, with up to 60 people turning up to events.
Golf has long had a reputation for being a man's game, specifically a rich old man's game — an extension of a board meeting for high-flying execs. But the sport has recently seen a major upswing in popularity. Its reach, which includes people who have visited a driving range, golf course, or consumed golf content, is up 30% since 2016, the National Golf Foundation says. Nearly 1.5 million more people than the prepandemic average — 3.4 million total — played golf for the first time in 2023, with the highest level of participation among adults 18 to 34. One of the biggest drivers of the increase has been a new interest among young women: Thirty-seven percent of golfers 18 and younger were female in 2023, compared to just 15% in 2000.
Ironically, golf's long history of exclusivity and elitism is part of its ascendant appeal among Gen Z. Zoomers are increasingly interested in cosplaying as "old money" aristocracy — polo shirts, tennis skirts, and airport lounge martinis — as a means of manifesting their burning desire to get rich. Two-thirds of Gen Z and nearly three-quarters of millennials ...
