THE CHEVRON CHAMPIONSHIP

April 21, 2026

Stacy Lewis

The Club at Carlton Woods

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: Okay, joining us ahead of The Chevron Championship is Stacy Lewis. Stacy, you announced your retirement in the fall but you're back here playing this one last event.

STACY LEWIS: Yeah.

Q. Can you talk about what went into that decision and what your goals for this week and your new profession.

STACY LEWIS: Yeah, so the end of last year I was hoping to end the year in Florida where I could get some family members there to watch me play, but my last event ended up being in Hawai'i, so it was just me and my daughter there.

So just wanted to give my parents one more chance to see me play and family members and friends.

And then this tournament, it was my first win. It means a lot to me. And then growing up here in Houston, I played all over the city. I didn't play Memorial when I was a kid but played so much golf in this area that just felt like the perfect place to come back one more time and call it good.

But I will say the last several weeks of trying to get ready to play again just kind of affirmed my decision to retire. Looking forward to getting through this week and then going back to normal life.

Q. You mentioned it, but you'll have some family out here supporting you. You also announced some exciting news, that you're pregnant with your second child.

STACY LEWIS: Yes.

Q. Your husband will be on the bag this week.

STACY LEWIS: Uh-huh.

Q. Talk about the whole familial aspect of your life right now, especially settling into being a non-LPGA Tour mom.

STACY LEWIS: Yeah, well, it's kind of funny actually. My last round I played when I was pregnant with Chesnee my husband was caddieing for me, so he'll get both of the last tournaments together.

You know, just I've got aunts and uncles flying in for this week and just a lot of friends in the area that I know are going to come. Chesnee is excited to go to daycare for one more week and get to see everybody there.

It really is like -- I guess this week has become more of a celebration than it was originally supposed to be, especially with being pregnant and life changing again.

I didn't know what I was going to do in retirement but I guess I know what I'm going to do now.

But I'm looking forward to the next few years of raising a kid at home and not cleaning bottles in hotel rooms and trying to travel every week. So looking forward to that.

Q. How did this golf community here in Houston help shape and kind of raise you?

STACY LEWIS: Gosh, I mean, I played in Houston Golf Association events all summer, all over the city. I think it was on Wednesdays were our tournaments every week. Just growing up in Texas, the amount of girls that were playing - and this was 25, 30 years ago no - but the number of kids that were playing in it was competitive.

And playing in Texas, it's windy, it's hot; you got a lot of the conditions. I feel like it shaped me into the player that I am that when the weather gets bad, I play better. I think that's why I won in Scotland a couple times in my career and played well all over the world.

You know, my game was able to travel, just kind of growing up in this area.

Q. What has it meant to you to give back to this community, for example Hurricane Harvey?

STACY LEWIS: Well, it's home. Houston is home. When Harvey happened it was really hard. It was personal. My husband was dealing with a bunch of college kids trying to get them out of the city, and it's just really cool to give back.

I think this tournament is going to do the same thing of having the little girls like myself now get to see professional golf up close and have aspirations of jumping in the pond here one day and getting to do all this.

So it's just home and just felt like the right thing to do.

Q. What's the best thing and most challenging thing about having your husband on the bag?

STACY LEWIS: That's a good question. Most challenging thing is he always -- you know, he's a little bit nervous on when to step up and say things.

The best thing is that he knows me and he knows when I need to be pushed and when he needs to just kind of let me go off to the side.

So a little bit of both. But it's going to be a lot of fun. This time of the year, too, he's busy with his season, so we don't get a ton of time together. It'll just be nice to have some time together.

Q. What do you imagine the emotions will be like for you this week as you kind of wrap it up for good?

STACY LEWIS: I don't know. I have no idea. I haven't thought about it to be honest. I hope it's on Sunday. That's my goal is for it to be on Sunday and not on Friday.

But I don't know. I'm just excited. It's not sad. There was times I thought about retiring before and it was sad. But I'm more excited about it now than I am. It's more -- as you go along in your career it's about the people and just getting to see all the caddies and everybody coming up and giving you hugs and the other players and the staff.

It just becomes more about the people as you get older, and that's what I'm going to miss the most. I'm going to have a lot of my people here so I'm excited.

Q. As you were making this decision was there a moment where you kind of realized like this is not sad, that you were ready, as opposed to looking back at other times where you were like I don't want to do this?

STACY LEWIS: Yeah, it was actually about this time last year where it -- I wanted to come -- kind of come out of Solheim and prove to myself that there still was some good golf in there. Once I did that it was kind of like, okay, I'm good.

That's what all the older players told me. They said you know when you know. There is not a reason. There is not a why. You just know. And that's what it was for me.

Q. Stacy, regarding golfing while expecting, any difference from the first time around for you now?

STACY LEWIS: No. I mean, luckily everything has been okay so far. It's actually been very nice. With the hormones and everything you're body gets a lot looser so my body hurts a lot less which has been enjoyable.

For me, my golf swing gets flatter so that's helped my golf swing as well. So my caddie, my old caddie, Travis he's like, yeah, you played good when you were pregnant, so who knows what will happen this week. (Laughter.)

Q. Is it a little bittersweet for you to maybe not have Travis there to walk with you one last time? I know Gerrod is super special, but is that bittersweet at all?

STACY LEWIS: It is a little bit, but I want the best for Travis. I want him to be successful. We talked. This was actually before he was with Hyo Joo Kim. This was before she won those two tournaments. He was like, I think I'll probably get fired. I said, well, you need to not get fired.

You know, I want you to stay with her. She's a really good player. I think he can help her a lot. She's got a good chance to win this week, so that's what I want for Travis. I want him to have that opportunity to jump in that pond again.

But I've seen him a couple times this week and we'll get caught up. All good.

Q. What do you remember about your pond jump?

STACY LEWIS: That water was so cold. You know, I just -- there has been a lot of debate about the pond and the jump. I've told a lot of people that I don't remember getting the trophy. A lot of things I don't remember about that ceremony. But I remember the jump and what that felt like and how cold that water was in California.

Like it was the coolest thing in the world. Because I had seen -- I had been on the green when Morgan did her jump as low am, and seeing all those other players over the years make the jump and to get to do that yourself was just so cool. Like you get to be a kid again and just have fun with it.

In a world that's become very serious and everything has to be a certain way, like it's just fun to be -- to have fun again and just be a kid. So I would love to do it again. Be pretty fun.

Q. You talked about all the kids you've inspired. You've done so much for the LPGA Tour across the course of your career on the golf course, off the golf course. When you look at the legacy that you hope you have left, that's instilled in these women, what does that legacy look like?

STACY LEWIS: I hope they have seen -- a lot of them have seen what I've done behind the scenes to help the Tour, and the little things that I do. I've tried to instill that in the players, you know, especially those Solheim players, just tried to get them to see how they can help outside of just playing golf.

You know, I don't know, I try to lead by example I guess and do the right thing and trying to get other people to follow.

I care a lot and I care too much probably at times, but, yeah, I just want to see this tour be successful, and so I'll stick around as much as they'll let me.

Q. Going back to the pond jump for a second, I don't know if you've seen the makeshift pond?

STACY LEWIS: Yes.

Q. And then the plans to create a real pond?

STACY LEWIS: Uh-huh.

Q. How important do you think it is for the LPGA and the she have Tron keep that tradition alive and keep a tradition in women's golf at the forefront?

STACY LEWIS: Yeah, so if you go back on our history, we really don't do a very good job with traditions at all, right? We've had three majors, we've had four, we've had five. The LPGA Championship became the PGA Championship.

So we've really lost a lot of traditions over the years. This is probably one the only ones we have, and people don't understand when you say oh, we'll just go there and make a new tradition.

I mean, it took what did it take, almost 20 years to develop the pond jump. Traditions don't just happen overnight. I just think it's so important that we keep it and that it's -- is it a little bit different this year? Yes. Does it look great? I mean, it's up for debate, right?

But somebody is still going to jump in there and it's still going to be -- when we look back on 10 years we're going to put all these jumps together and they're all going to look the same. So I just think we got to get through this year but it has to continue.

I think we had a past champions dinner last night and you ask all the players in that room, the jump's got to stay. So I think when we made -- when we moved from California to Carlton Woods, Chevron did a great thing in that they put a player advisory group together, older players and current and some young ones just out on Tour.

They asked us what traditions are important, what can we keep in California, what needs to move, what doesn't? We all said the jump has to stay and Dinah has to be -- Dinah has to go with us, too.

They've done -- Chevron has done an amazing job of keeping all that going for us.

Q. How would you describe the current water feature and how would you celebrate in there?

STACY LEWIS: I thought it was going to be a little bit bigger. That would be my only complaint about it. So you're going to have to be to be a little bit careful with your jump. If Lorena's whole crew was here trying to jump in they would definitely not fit in that pond. Going to be a little bit limited on who jumps in.

But I think it's really cool, especially you get the people, get the fans standing right there on the edge. They're probably going to get wet when somebody jumps in.

They did a really good job of doing the best they could given the situation. It's going to be a lot better when we come back next year, and frankly the 18th green is going to be a lot better, too. It's going to fit more with the golf course and now, the last four finishing holes will all have water on them.

It's going to allow for a much better finish, too.

Q. One final question from me: You are throwing out the first pitch at the Astros game this weekend.

STACY LEWIS: Yeah.

Q. Talk about what that's going to mean to you.

STACY LEWIS: So I was here for the Houston Open speaking at a function and the Astros Foundation was there and they asked me kind of a favorite golf memory and then a favorite baseball memory.

I said well my favorite baseball memory was throwing out first pitch at Wrigley, which was really cool.

And they asked if I had thrown out a first pitch her in Houston and I was like, no, and you could see the wheels spinning. So it would be really cool. I've gone to tons of games over the years and fan of the Astros so I'm really excited.

Again the whole family gets to come and make it a family thing so it'll be fun.