Cristie Kerr’s Happy Place

Why the LPGA superstar absolutely adores the Scottsdale area.

Mountain Standard Time evidently agrees with Cristie Kerr. Less than 24 hours have passed since she returned from competing in South Korea’s Hana Bank Kolon Championship, and the leading U.S.-born player in the Rolex World Rankings shows not the slightest bit of jetlag as she toasts her adopted Arizona hometown.  

“We love the landscape, the culture and the people,” says Kerr, who has lived here since 2006 with her husband and agent, Erik Stevens, in a three-bedroom stone and stucco home on the far north end of Scottsdale. “It’s so much more casual and laid back than it is back east.” Kerr, who calls Florida, where she grew up and owns property with her mother, “home home,” also has an apartment with Stevens in New York City. “But in Arizona I can wake up, go to the golf course, linger for awhile. I can wear jeans all the time and cowboy boots.”

She’s bought a number of those custom boots at Spirit of the West, a clothing store in nearby Cave Creek, the town she calls “the hidden gem” of the Scottsdale/Phoenix area. “It’s only five miles from where we live, and the shops and galleries run the gamut from sublime to funky,” observes Kerr, who names The Town Dump her favorite among the funkier furnishing stores. 

“Likewise,” she adds, “the dining and nightlife in Cave Creek ranges from the gourmet craftsmanship of Binkley’s—Kevin Binkley, the chef, comes from The French Laundry in Napa and he has a great wine list—and the excellent steaks at Cartwright’s Sonoran Ranch House to a collection of rowdy honkytonks and roadhouses, like Harrold’s Corral, where they hitch up horses outside, and the Buffalo Chip, which has live bull riding on Friday nights.” 

About the only thing she doesn’t like about Cave Creek is the aggressive traffic cops. “The speed limit is 20, and believe me, they enforce it,” the BMWx6 driver says with an irritated sigh. 

A budding wine connoisseur with tentative plans to enter the viticulture business, Kerr keeps approximately 1,000 bottles at home “to drink, not collect,” and is equally passionate about Western art. She favors works by John Nieto. Chuck Middlekauff, and Duke Beardsley, among others. An original oil by Jim C. Norton hangs above the fireplace in her living room, and on Thursday nights, she and Stevens often head to Old Town Scottsdale’s ArtWalk, where “we’ll drink some wine and walk through the galleries, have dinner at Cowboy Ciao and follow that with a nightcap behind the restaurant at Kazamierz World Wine Bar.” 

Whether it’s at a gallery, the FBR Open, an Arizona Cardinals football game or a contest involving the NHL’s Phoenix Coyotes, Kerr says she gets recognized more in golf-centric Arizona than anywhere else. And she likes it. “You work to be recognized for your accomplishments,” says the 2008 U.S. Women’s Open champion. “It’s different when I’m in New York, which is bigger than any one person or any one celebrity. I think celebrities move there so they can lead normal lives.”

What’s “normal” for Kerr is the opportunity Arizona presents to hone her craft. “We have access to some of the best golf clubs in the country,” she points out, citing as her favorites the private clubs of Mirabel (where she’s a member), The Golf Club of Scottsdale, Silverleaf, Whisper Rock and Superstition Mountain. “But the public courses at Troon North, Kierland, Legend Trail, and Grayhawk—where they host a PGA Tour event (the Frys.com Open)—are outstanding as well. There’s so much great golf, I’ve not even played Desert Forest—if you can believe it—and it’s only three minutes from my house.” 

For all her on-course success, including five consecutive Solheim Cup appearances and more than $10 million in career earnings (placing her sixth all-time in the LPGA), Kerr keeps a healthy perspective on golf’s importance in her life. "Golf is what I do, not who I am," she told writer Gregory Cerio in one of the last issues of Golf For Women. "The game doesn't define me." 

So, in addition to using golf as a catalyst for cultural and financial enrichment (sponsors include Mutual of Omaha, Fireman Capital Partners, Lacoste, Audemars Piguet and New Jersey’s Liberty National Golf Club), she founded Birdies for Breast Cancer in 2004 after her mother, Linda, was diagnosed with the disease. For every birdie she makes, Kerr donates $50, and for every eagle $100. Mutual of Omaha matches every dollar, and to date, the charity has raised more than $700,000.

Of all the things golf has given Kerr — homes in two of the country’s most spectacular areas, a husband with whom she connects both romantically and in a business sense, world travel and the ability to be philanthropic—she says there’s still one thing it hasn’t allowed for. “I’m still waiting for my honeymoon,” she says with a laugh. “Erik says our whole life is one big honeymoon, but I still want one.”

Jon Rizzi is Colorado AvidGolfer’s editor. For more information about Cristie Kerr and Birdies for Breast Cancer, visit cristiekerrgolf.com.