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15 year-old Michelle Wie won this year¡¯s Laureus Newcomer Award, defeating five other nominees including U.S basketball super rookie LeBron James, Brazilian soccer star Robinho and promising U.S. golfer Ben Curtis.
The award ceremony was held in Lisbon, Portugal on Tuesday (Korean time).
The sponsor Laureus World Sports Academy said ¡°her performance suggests she may change the face of golf,¡± referring to her sub-par round in the Sony Open, a men's PGA Tour event, in January.
Michelle Wie won at the U.S. Women's Amateur Public Links Championship last year. Wie participated in seven events on the U.S. LPGA Tour last season and missed only one cut.
Wie is the youngest person to win one of the Laureus awards, which was created in 2000. Chinese NBA star Yao Ming won the Laureus Newcomer of the Year last year.
The Laureus Sportsman of the Year went to Michael Schumacher who won the F1 Grand Prix six times. Swedish golfer Annika Sorenstam was the Sportswoman of the Year. Sorenstam achieved the lifetime grand slam by winning four major golf events.
The Laureus World Sports Academy is composed of 42 global sports figures including Edwin Moses, Michael Jordan, Boris Becker, Mark Spitz, Katarina Witt and Deng Yaping.
The academy selects nominees and 400 sports reporters from all around the world vote to decide the winners. Other celebrities including actors Michael Douglas and Morgan Freeman and tenor Placido Domingo also attended this year¡¯s ceremony, which was aired across the world drawing the attention of 300 million viewers.
(Kim Seong-hyun, danpa@chosun.com )
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