When Mirabel Ting tees off Thursday in the first round of the Amundi Evian Championship, it will mark her first action as a professional.
She’ll be playing for more than herself, too.
Ting, 19, decided last week to forgo her final season at Florida State and turn pro in time to make her major-championship debut. Before she released the news to the world, Ting flew home to Malaysia to tell her grandfather, Ng Siaw Pheng.
It was Ting’s grandfather who would take Mirabel and her older, Malcolm, to play a quick nine holes after school, while also funding their tournament schedules and other golf-related endeavors, including Mirabel’s boarding-school tuition in Australia.
“He has been supporting my journey since I was a kid,” Ting said of her grandfather.
Ng Siaw Pheng health had been declining, and when Mirabel arrived, he was barely awake as she told him, “Hey, I’m playing in the Evian as a professional, and I would like you to watch me play.”
Days later, when Mirabel was at the airport to head to France, she received the “phone call that I didn’t want.” Her grandfather had died.
“It’s hard,” Ting said. “I don’t know, it’s kind of like a mixed feeling for me right now. But this is part of my life, and I just want to do it for him.”
This isn’t the first time that Ting has experienced loss. Her grandmother died in 2020 while Mirabel was in Australia. Then two years later in fall 2022, Mirabel, on her way to a tournament as a freshman at Augusta University, received word that she’d also lost her father, Thomas, to a heart attack. She’ll carry the memories of all three with her this week at Evian Resort.
“This week’s going to be bigger than myself,” Ting added.
Ting, the reigning Annika Award winner, has previously made just one LPGA start – she competed in last year’s Maybank Championship in her native Malaysia, where she tied for 12th. That was amid a torrid stretch of college golf in which Ting won six of her first seven tournaments for the Seminoles. She capped her impressive season by going third-second-second at the ACC Championship, NCAA Lexington Regional and NCAA Championship, respectively.
Florida State head coach Amy Bond has long called Ting “the best ball-striker I’ve ever seen,” and Ting’s switch to instructor Kris Assawapimonporn, who most notably works with Jeeno Thitikul, late last year has helped her revamp her putting.
To officially announce her decision, Ting worked with Florida State’s creative department to draft a long thank-you post, which she closed with:
“A 10-year-old Mirabel could never have imagined this moment, but after years of dedication and heart, I’m proud to announce that I’m turning professional and chasing my dream of playing on the LPGA tour. I can’t wait to see where this journey leads.”
