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Bobbi Lancaster (born June 23, 1950) is a family physician, champion golfer, author, human rights advocate, and motivational speaker. [1] She garnered international media attention in 2013 while attempting to qualify for the LPGA Tour as a transgender woman. [1] [2]
Bobbi Lancaster was born in 1950 in Chatham, Ontario, Canada. [3] Her family moved to Hamilton, Ontario, in 1960. [3] Lancaster attended McMaster University, where she captained the men's varsity golf team to two OUAA championships. [4]
She attended McMaster University Medical School, graduating with an M.D. degree in 1978. [4] She established a family practice in Hamilton before moving to Phoenix, Arizona, in 1991. [4] In Arizona, she served as a medical director for Advanced Health Care and Hospice of the Valley. [4]
Lancaster graduated from Cathedral Boys High School in 1969 as one of the top students. She had captained the varsity golf team and had participated on the track and field team. She high jumped six feet in a city meet. Lancaster also participated in soccer, hockey and the chess club.[ citation needed ]
Lancaster excelled at golf from a young age, winning the prestigious caddy championship at Hamilton Golf and C.C. in her early teens. At 11, she won a caddie tournament at the club, beating peers who were in their late teens. [5] She also qualified for the Ontario Caddy Championship. During high school she captained the Cathedral Boys varsity team to multiple victories. She also won junior tournaments, interclub matches representing Chedoke Civic Golf Course and was victorious as a member of the CANUSA Games golf team. In her late teens and twenties, Lancaster won multiple club championships at Chedoke. She also qualified and competed in several Canadian and Ontario Amateur Championships as well as the Ontario Open, a professional event. Lancaster also captained the McMaster University Men's Varsity Golf Team [5] to two OUAA Championships (1972 and 1974).[ citation needed ]
When she began her medical career in 1980, Lancaster joined Hamilton Golf and C.C. where she quickly became club champion and three-time Sclater Bowl champion. She successfully represented the club in interclub and Somerville Matches. Upon moving to Phoenix, she competed on the Western States Tour in 1997 and won a professional event at Palm Valley Golf Course. After moving to Gold Canyon, she became Senior Club Champion at Superstition Mountain Golf Club in 2008. After Lancaster's transition in 2012 and her unexpected unemployment and free time, she took up golf with renewed enthusiasm. She received permission from the USGA to compete as a female and promptly won the Papago Club Championship against some of the best players in Arizona. After several more victories, there were complaints that her prior status as a male gave her an unfair advantage around strength and distance. Lancaster basically handicapped herself and became a professional golfer in 2013. She competed on the Cactus Tour against elite players forty years younger. She enjoyed modest success and was instrumental in changing the Cactus Tour's female-at-birth gender policy. Lancaster then attempted to qualify for the LPGA Tour, under their new transgender policy, and competed in the LPGA Qualifying Tournament in 2013. She failed in her attempt but did gain conditional status on the Symetra Tour. Various life events curtailed her golf adventures (see Media and Advocacy below) and she regained her amateur status in 2016. Lancaster still competes occasionally and represented Papago Golf Course in interclub matches in 2017. She is also once again their club champion.[ citation needed ]
When Lancaster became a professional golfer and attempted to qualify for the LPGA Tour at sixty three years of age, her story garnered international media attention. [1] It started after Paola Boivin (senior sports columnist for the Arizona Republic ) received a complaint from a fan about how inappropriate it was to see her playing on the Cactus Tour. [1] This resulted in a full-length feature about her golf dreams, her personal life and her work as a physician. The story was picked up nationally and Boivin was nominated for a Sports Emmy. Following that article, stories appeared in the Canadian newspapers, Huffington Post, USA Today, Good Morning America, Canadian Medical Post. [1] Lancaster agreed to interviews with TMZ Sports, Channel 12 News, New Times weekly newspaper, McMaster Times Alumnae magazine, Echo magazine, Freedom for All Americans and The League of Fans. There was a documentary that appeared on national television produced by the Golf Channel (interview conducted by multiple Emmy Award-winner Jimmy Roberts). There were also documentaries exploring Lancaster's life by Cronkite News, Sports Illustrated (golf.com) and the Human Rights Campaign (Arizona).[ citation needed ]
As a result of the media attention, Lancaster has become a minor celebrity. She has been asked to give educational and motivational speeches to various groups including students at the University of Kansas, Arizona State University, Chandler and Gilbert Community Colleges, Stanford School of Law and McMaster School of Medicine. She has also given speeches to Phoenix Valley Leadership, the Arizona Women Lawyers Convention in Tucson, the Performing Artists Medical Association International Symposium (NYC 2016). Lancaster's efforts promoting awareness of transgender issues caught the attention of the Human Rights Campaign. She was awarded their 2015 Equality Award at a gala in Phoenix in 2015 where her famous Humpty Dumpty acceptance speech can be found on YouTube. She was elected to their national Board of Directors in 2016. She has worked tirelessly on their behalf, lobbying on Capitol Hill and at the Arizona State Capitol. Lancaster has participated in a White House Summit, at town hall meetings and has canvassed and phone-banked for pro-LGBTQ candidates. She has also partnered with One Community and One n Ten to advocate for transgender acceptance and equality and has lobbied on her own as a private citizen. Lancaster was also elected to Echo Magazine's Hall of Fame in 2015. [6]
Lancaster has authored many short nature stories that were published in the Gold Canyon Ledger.[ citation needed ] She also wrote and illustrated a children's book called My Friend Flutter and wrote a short book about an unlikely meeting with her deceased father titled Fairway Secrets.[ citation needed ] She has recently completed a full-length memoir called The Red Light Runner and is actively looking for a publisher at this writing. [7]
