The Golf Analyst
Kaihryn Savarese Lazerow '93
When Time Inc. paid $24 million for Lazerow's Golf.com, it acquired the premiere provider of Internet golf content. The Web site, which draws 1.3 million visitors monthly, had its genesis in an Excel spreadsheet Lazerow developed as a Dartmouth senior to improve her golf game.
A U.S.Tennis Association-ranked tennis player when she came to Dartmouth, Lazerow was sidelined from the tennis team with an injury. She joined the College golf team at the urging of Tracy Welch '93 and Sarah Davis '93. "Coach Izzy Johnson walked behind each player and tracked these important metrics that measured each player's progress: driver hit off of tee, hit fairway, greens in regulation, total putts, average putts per hole, penalty strokes, number of eagles, birdies, pars and bogeys," she says. "These are some of the stats that were tracked to help each player understand what they were doing at practice."
Lazerow put the data into a spreadsheet so she could more easily see the results and percentages. "I was very ritualistic from tennis, and the way I learned was by tracking my statistics," she says. After graduating with an A.B. in economics, Lazerow honed her golf game while forging a career in marketing and public relations. Her spreadsheet was converted into a Web-based application after she and her brother James Savarese '88 ran info trouble e-mailling spreadsheets back and forth. "I figured he couldn't cheat if he had to enter it online," she jokes. Thinking her application would appeal to other golfers, Lazerow enlisted the aid of childhood friend (and future husband) Michael Lazerow, and Golf.com was born. In addition to the $30 annual membership that enables golfers to log performance, the site carries coverage of the PGA, Champions and Nationwide Tours, including hole-by-hole leaderboard results.
The couple and their two sons relocated from Maryland to New York City in January to help with the Time Inc. transition. And for her next move, "I have some other ideas I want to pursue," says Lazerow. "But I promised Mike that I wouldn't start a new company right away."
