Before they even say hello to their caddies or hit a practice ball at Mission Hills Country Club each spring, before they've made the first birdie that might lead to golf's unique celebratory splash in a greenside lake, LPGA players feel something special.
It might be in California instead of Georgia, but an enduring major championship, the first of the year, produces a mood that spans generations.
"You drive in and you get goose bumps and the heart starts beating a little faster," says Patty Sheehan, the 58-year-old Hall of Famer who won the tournament in 1996, "similar to what the guys get when they drive down Magnolia Lane."
"Jumping into Poppie's Pond is something all the golfers look forward to doing," says Michelle Wie, only 25 but a veteran of 10 events there, including a runner-up finish last year. "You grow up wanting to do it. It's just the history. You walk that bridge to the 18th green every day during the tournament and you see all the names, all the Hall of Famers, so many legends who are on it. All you want to do is be able to join that wall."
When Kraft Foods ended its sponsorship of the long-running major southeast of Palm Springs in Rancho Mirage, California, after the 2014 edition, there understandably was plenty of angst among the tour's administration and players. Considered a major beginning in 1983 and a vital week in women's golf since the tournament began in 1972, there was a chance it could go away.
"I think us players would have thrown in money for this event to keep it going, because there is so much history," says Brittany Lincicome, the 2009 champion at Mission Hills thanks to a dramatic eagle on the 72nd hole. "When the commissioner told us we didn't have a sponsor, we had a bad feeling in our stomachs. And when he came to us and said that ANA was coming on board, we were super relieved."
The tournament lives on, kicking off a new era this week at the only home it has ever had with a new name: the ANA Inspiration sponsored by Japanese airline All Nippon Airways.
"It would have been devastating to lose it," says Jane Blalock, winner of the inaugural Colgate-Dinah Shore Winners Circle at Mission Hills in 1972. "The LPGA's landscape has changed so much, it's something to hold on to. We always have to move forward with what's best for today, but you can't do that without strong traditions from the past."
Blalock still has a framed Golf World magazine cover of herself -- with pigtails and wearing short shorts -- after winning that first event. Although it wouldn't be designated a major championship for another decade, the tournament was still a groundbreaking occasion. First prize was $20,050, a sum that rivaled the total purses at some LPGA events of the era. Colgate's clout and Shore's celebrity created buzz.
"The tournament was so significant monetarily and really marked a change in how the LPGA was perceived," Blalock says. "We went from a number of chamber of commerce-type sponsored events to a world stage with Dinah Shore and other stars. Colgate put so much into it. We were treated like rock stars. At that time, it felt like the most major of majors."
LPGA legend Mickey Wright came out of retirement in 1973 to win the event that was then -- and still -- referred to by many as "The Dinah" even though the entertainer's name was controversially removed from the title in 2000. Wright's victory presaged a trend: Just as most of the finest male golfers have tended to win the Masters in their careers, the best female golfers of their eras have prevailed at Mission Hills.
Whether for stars or players still looking to establish themselves, the atmosphere spills over well outside the tournament ropes. Gabe Codding, the tournament director who took over in 2009 after Terry Wilcox's retirement, discovered a measure of how ingrained in the community the event is when doing a transportation survey a decade ago. The 120-player field was staying in approximately 40 locations.
"A lot of the golfers had found private housing when they were amateurs or young players on tour, and they continued to foster those relationships through the years," Codding says. "It's not the typical event where everybody goes to a host hotel."
Nor, of course, is the aprés-golf on Sunday afternoon for the champion your normal hugs-and-high-fives scene.
"You want to win that tournament; you want to get that robe," says 2011 champion Stacy Lewis. "It's one of the best traditions we have on tour. People know the tournament from jumping in the pond."
Lewis and her mother -- who broke a bone in her leg jumping in with her daughter -- and everyone else can thank three-time winner Amy Alcott, who in 1988, on the urging of her caddie, Bill Kurre, was the first to get wet.
"It was just a moment of excitement," Alcott says of her plunge into Champions Lake. "I was starting a tradition, but I really didn't know I was starting one. We didn't know how deep the water was. There were ducks in there and duck doo. You just had to hold your nose. But I can still hear the crowd -- they went crazy."
Alcott went in again three years later after an eight-stroke victory that turned out to be her last LPGA title, this time with Shore.
"My mother had passed away recently, and Dinah urged me on to win that year and told me she would go in the water with me," Alcott says. "She was waiting across the bridge in a pair of black pants. She always wore white pants. So I knew she was serious."
The jump wasn't a regular occurrence until Donna Andrews won in 1994. Since then, each winner has gone into Champions Lake. The robes came in with Nanci Bowen the following year. The unique victory lap is more on the minds of players than one might think.
Three-time winner Betsy King didn't jump in after winning in 1987 and 1990. To this day, she laments her lackluster form when going in after earning the hat trick in 1997. "If I could do it again, I would do a better jump. I kind of walked in. The victory leap in and of itself makes the tournament special, makes it different. The men really don't have that."
Lincicome, too, would like a mulligan. "You walk by that pond in so many practice rounds and for a couple of years until I won it. And you think, 'Am I going to do a cannonball, am I going to do a belly flop?' When it was actually time for me to do it, my head was blank. I just ran and jumped. Hopefully before I retire, I will get another win there and redeem myself and do something fun."
Poppie's Pond came to be in 2006 on the event's 35th anniversary, as a tribute to Wilcox -- his grandchildren call him Poppie. That area was separated from Champions Lake and turned into a de facto swimming pool with a concrete bottom and a sloping ramp to make it easier to exit the water. It's much different from what greeted many former winners, including 1999 champ Dottie Pepper, who got a bacterial infection after her celebration.
"It's fresh well water that comes up there," Codding says of the jump zone, 6 feet deep in the middle. "It's the cleanest water in the valley."
To get to that point, a golfer will have successfully navigated Mission Hills, a complete layout that, according to 1986 winner Pat Bradley, "tests every club in your bag and tests you physically and emotionally. That's what a major does, that's what a great course does, and that's Mission Hills."
Despite the new sponsor, the experience won't be much different from what Bradley or other competitors went through at Mission Hills.
"We don't have a lot of new stuff we're announcing this year," Codding says. "We understand the history and legacy and are honored to be a part of it and stewards moving forward. ANA is saying let's experience it before we propose anything new, deeply understand the traditions and then find ways we can bring our own touches to it to enhance the overall experience. There is not a huge ambition to change a lot of the traditions, only to enhance them."
The years of wondering how long Kraft would continue as title sponsor, or worry who would replace it when it did leave are over.
"I think you're going to see renewed excitement from players, fans and the community," Codding says. "We don't have to think of the 'what ifs' anymore."
ANA is contracted through 2019 to sponsor the tournament, which has bumped its purse $500,000 to $2.5 million. Far from the position it held for a long time, it offers a smaller purse than the LPGA's other majors, whose purses range from $3 million at the Women's British Open to $4 million at the U.S. Women's Open.
"Especially with what the PGA of America has done with the new KPMG Women's PGA and the U.S. Open, it's definitely a tall order, but we're going to trend to get back to a relevant spot," Codding says. "I would love to see that, because years ago this was the principal event that pushed the women's purses up."
The money certainly matters, because these are women who play golf for a living. But especially at Mission Hills, it isn't everything. Not even close.