Up To Par With Peyton

“What is your plan if TV doesn’t work out?” A phrase I have heard far too much as I navigate the world as a future broadcast meteorologist. As a female going into this male dominant industry, people think this phrase should scare me – but it doesn’t. Less than 30% of all broadcast meteorologist are female and there’s roughly over 7,000 females that play college golf. Both very low numbers and both categories I fall into. After playing golf for a junior college in Oklahoma, I realized college athletics was not for me and it was time to chase another one of my dreams. After I transferred to OU, I still wanted to keep golf a huge part of my life, so I began working at a local golf course and coaching private lessons.

The sport of golf is growing tremendously. Over 9.5 million people watched ‘The Masters’ in 2021 and many are picking up the club for themselves. Not only is weather a very complex thing, but so is golf. When the PGA Championship decided to call Tulsa, Oklahoma home in May of 2022, I had an idea. Golf is an outdoor game and people will obviously endure different times of weather throughout their play, but HOW that weather impacts their game is even more important. With the help of Baron technology and equipment from OU Nightly, I was able to create a social media series about how different types of weather will impact a round of golf called #UpToParWithPeyton. What started out as forecasts for the Men’s and Women’s golf teams at OU became a passion and potential future career opportunity of combining two things, I love that I also happen to have background knowledge with.

TV news and local weather will always be my goal, but with recent changes to the PGA Tour and the new LIV Tour, change in the industry is occurring and you never know what can happen or who will do it.