It is difficult to picture Golfing World’s Iona Stephen as a woebegone figure sitting in a supermarket car park wondering what on earth she should do with her life. Yet go back four years and that is precisely where she was.
Stephen, who is currently excelling in her capacity as a TV commentator, had set her heart on making it as a top tour professional when an ongoing wrist problem forced a halt to her aspirations. There had been a niggle in the wrist before she made her professional debut in the LET’s 2016 Qatar Masters. However, when it was diagnosed as nothing more sinister than a cyst, she somehow expected it to disappear with the next round of treatment.
Steroid injections worked to kill the inflammation for a while, but the more injections she had, the shorter the period they knocked out the pain. The next step consisted of what Stephen described as “a very intrusive operation.” It went well and she poured her all into 10 months of rehabilitation.
Sadly, nothing was any better after that.
Yet soul-destroying though it all was, the Scot refused to accept there was nothing more that could be done. Amid mounting desperation, she flew here, there and everywhere in search of an appropriate treatment. Her most recent trip was to the United States to investigate a stem-cell procedure. That, though, never happened when her investigations coincided with a diagnosis which shook her to the core. She had developed Stage 4 osteoarthritis, and all because she had had too many of those early steroid injections.
“I’m happy to share my story because I would hate for other golfers to make the same mistakes as I did,” she says.
While cars came and went in that gloomy supermarket setting, Iona embarked on a desultory if automatic scroll through her e-mails. One message made her sit up a bit. It came from the International Management Group’s London HQ and said they were looking for a presenter for an anonymous golf show. They wondered if she would like to come along for an interview. Stephen could only think that someone in the organisation must have followed her litany of injury setbacks on social media.
She accepted the offer, but so low were her expectations she never mentioned it to anyone. Not even to her parents and her two older brothers back in Scotland.
Her curriculum vitae would have made interesting reading for IMG. After school days in Edinburgh, she studied architecture at the Glasgow School of Art. Although she found the course interesting, this all-round sportswoman – she had been involved at junior international level in all four of squash, hockey, lacrosse and athletics – had already decided her future lay in golf. And never mind that she was only a beginner.
She switched to St Andrews University after 12 months, ostensibly to study art history when what really appealed was the idea of hitting balls on the range where Victor Perez, who has a Dundee-based partner, practises on a regular basis. It was during her first year at the Home of Golf, when she heard how Wentworth were offering golf scholarships for an accelerated performance programme, that she moved on again.
Nothing, perhaps, captures her combination of talent and unbridled enthusiasm better than how, when she started working with Wentworth’s head professional Christian Baker – the man who coached Ross Fisher – she reduced her handicap from 4 to plus-3 in a single season.
Stephen did what she felt was an “OK” interview in London.
“I wasn’t holding out much hope, but a fortnight later I got this phone call asking if I wanted to be a presenter for Golfing World at the 2019 WGC-Mexico Championship.
“It didn’t sink in then and, (four) years later, it still hasn’t sunk in,” she laughs. “I found it such fun and I’m still finding it fun.”
“I don’t feel any competition in TV because it was a fluke that I got into it at all. For as long as they want me, I’ll do my best. Any other approach and I’d be getting in my own way.” — Iona Stephen
Hardly surprisingly, viewers have been no less taken with her than they were with Cara Banks and Anna Whiteley, two predecessors who very quickly found themselves heading to America after being snapped up for the Golf Channel’s Morning Drive.
As to which of sport or presenting she finds more competitive, Stephen has no hesitation in opting for the former.
“Definitely sport,” she said. “I don’t feel any competition in TV because it was a fluke that I got into it at all. For as long as they want me, I’ll do my best. Any other approach and I’d be getting in my own way.”
She recently contributed to a successful series in which she caddied for a hole for a series of European Tour players. To her great glee, she oversaw Matt Fitzpatrick making an eagle, while she was a total of 8-under par for the 10 holes involved. Small wonder she suspects she has the makings of a useful caddie.
It’s no surprise she has a huge respect for Helen Storey, Lee Westwood’s partner and bag carrier.
“There had to be lots of pressure on her at the start, but Lee’s recent results have to be partly down to her,” Stephen said. “Women are good at multitasking and I think that’s why they’re so good at the job.”
So if caddying and TV commentary could be combined, who would she choose to work for?
Very sensibly, she was not about to hurt any feelings.
“Anyone who would have me,” she replied.