Minjee Lee Caddying At Augusta Reopens Women's Masters Debate

There have been fresh calls for a Women's Masters after Minjee Lee was spotted caddying for her brother during Wednesday's weather-shortened Par-3 contest at Augusta National. 

Unlike tennis, for example, the calendars for golf's male and female Majors aren't in sync, nor are they played at the same venue. With the recent inroads Augusta National has made to ditch some of its outdated traditions, many are calling for that to extend to a female Major on the famous layout.

In the run-up to this year's Masters, Fred Ridley, Chairman of Augusta National Golf Club, told reporters he "wished we had" allowed women members sooner, while the club also made the surprise decision to allow the YouTube group known as Dude Perfect onto the grounds to produce content with Bryson DeChambeau. 

After admitting he had never heard of Dude Perfect, Ridley was quick to explain the reasoning, describing the move as "part of our continuing effort to be relevant to different age groups". 

As the World No. 4, Minjee is ranked 55 places higher than her brother Min Woo, and is also a Major champion having won the Evian Championship last year. Yet she had to settle for a supporting role on the eve of the 86th Masters, as Min Woo prepares to make his debut appearance.

She was given the opportunity to play a shot which she hit close, but is it about time the best female players in the world were allowed the chance to test their skills on the Bobby Jones and Alister MacKenzie inspired course?

After all, Augusta National now plays host as some of the brightest female amateurs battle it out for the Augusta National Women's Amateur (ANWA) title in the week before the men arrive. This arrangement began in 2019 and has proved immensely popular, so there's no reason to think the pros wouldn't enjoy similar success.

In response to this tweet, a user wrote: "Minjee shouldn’t be caddying for anyone… the world’s best women PRO golfers should get to play at Augusta. It should be like tennis... men and women should play the same Majors."

In her last outing Minjee finished on her own in seventh, as Mission Hills hosted the first women's Major of the year for the last time, with Jennifer Kupcho capturing the title by two shots from Jessica Korda.

Min Woo gets his delayed first round at The Masters underway at 9.25am local time (2.25pm UK time) alongside American duo Hudson Swafford and Cameron Young.