Karen Rackel doesn’t get teed off as much as she’d like these days but that doesn’t seem to bother her.
The St. Albert resident was recently inducted as the 108th president of Royal Canadian Golf Association (RCGA), the first woman to hold the position in the organization’s 116-year history. The RCGA amalgamated with the Canadian Ladies Golf Association to form one all-encompassing body that is designated by Sport Canada as the national sport organization for golf.
The move happened in 2005, the same year Rackel was a governor with the organization. Previously she has been involved with the administration at the Highlands Golf Club (her home club, she says, since she’s been playing there for 41 years) and was involved in the amalgamation between the Alberta Ladies Golf Association and the Alberta Golf Association (AGA). She later became president of the AGA and was tournament chair of the 2007 CN Canadian Women’s Open in Edmonton.
Rackel says her appointment is indeed a significant achievement for equality between the sexes but it’s also important because of what it means to Canada.
“I’m very proud for a lot of reasons,” she began. “Number one, I’m the first female. But number two, I’m a westerner.”
Apparently the title usually gets awarded to someone from the east. Her appointment is the sign of a growing trend within the world of golf to recognize that sport’s significance to people in Alberta. In the last 10 years, she’s the third president from the province.
She doesn’t really make too big of a deal about all of these former disparities that now seem to be getting corrected. What matters to her is that she’s able to share her love of the game with so many people.
She first got into the swing of things when she was 12 and has played pretty much ever since. Now, the busy practicing Edmonton-based lawyer has trouble freeing up some time to get to the greens.
“I have a golfing buddy and I haven’t — as you can imagine — played very much this summer. He said, ‘I know what RCGA stands for: Rarely Can Golf Anymore.’”
While she had trouble pinning down the date when she last played, she still remembers her first hole-in-one. It was a pretty momentous day for her.
It was June 15, 1984, exactly one year after she was admitted to the bar. Then Associate Chief Justice Allan Wachowich had just called her to congratulate her on the anniversary.
“I was so pleased that he had taken the time to call me. Later that day, I had a divorce client — he owed me $1,500. I was just so apprehensive that I was never going to collect that money, and he showed up and he paid me in cash that day.”
Later that afternoon, she was playing the third hole — a short par three — at the Highlands Golf Club. Her opponent teed off first.
“They put the ball two to three feet from the pin. I went up to the tee box and I said, ‘Well, the only way I’m going to win this hole is to put it in,’ and I actually did,” she laughed. “It was one of those days where the stars were all aligned.”
Her second hole-in-one was years later when she was president of the club. The club’s hole-in-one insurance apparently covers beverage tickets for whoever the lucky golfer selects to help celebrate.
“It was a Saturday and I was having such a good time. I thought, as president I couldn’t pick and choose who I was going to buy a drink for so I just said, ‘Drinks are on me!’ We had a great big social function and people kept coming in, I kept buying them drinks …” she said. “And then I thought, ‘Y’know, I’d better go home. This is going to cost me a lot of money.”
It’s that social aspect of golf that she hopes to promote during her term. It’s a popular sport, she says, one that outranks even soccer for participation.
“It’s a sport for everyone.”
