Min Woo Lee broke his finger before The Masters - but is playing anyway

The Australian has only one top-ten finish this year so far

Australian golfer Min Woo Lee will be hoping to record a personal best finish at The Masters over the weekend - but he’ll be battling injury and illness to do so.

The 25-year-old from Perth is set to feature for the third time at Augusta National, having finished T14 in 2022 before missing the cut last year - while a tough run of form has seen him land only a single top-ten finish so far in 2024 and he missed another cut at the Valspar Championship last time out at the end of March.

However, he’s somewhat fortunate to even have the chance to improve on his Masters fortunes and seasonal form - after breaking a finger during a gym session just a couple of weeks out.

“I dropped a dumbbell on my hand,” he explained. “I was in the gym Saturday last week. I was just doing like a side bridge glute thing and it was literally my last rep, last set, and I threw the dumbbell down and somehow clipped my right ring finger. Broke it.

“So I went to the doctor and I thought it was OK because I could move it. It was just red. I thought it would be fine. Then they came in and said, ‘you’ve broken it’. So [I had] a lot of anxiety. This is the first time telling the public. We didn’t know as a team to tell or to not, and I felt like I should tell people because there was a lot of pressure on me playing well.”

The No.32-ranked player in men’s golf has also been under the weather with flu and says he’s “not 100 per cent yet” but was happy to be out on the course for the Par 3 Contest on Wednesday.

Explaining his surprise at how fast he has been able to play again, the Australian joked he avoided the same piece of equipment while still continuing his strength and conditioning work ahead of the Masters.

The injured finger of Min Woo Lee (Getty Images)

Min Woo Lee on Par 3 day at the Masters (AP)

“Could have been a lot worse. I’m pretty happy to be standing here and especially playing nine holes and give it 100%,” he acknowledged.

“I mean, [my] recovery was very miraculously good. I have it bandaged up right now. I hit my first shot for the last week on Friday, so hit my first full driver. Honestly, it’s actually amazing how fast the recovery was. It was bruised, still swollen, but not actually that painful which is really strange. Somehow I’m recovering very good, so icing and elevating as much as I can.

“I still went to the gym last week as much as I could. Obviously didn’t do that exercise,” he added. “Every time I looked at that 20-pound dumbbell, yeah, gave it a death stare.”

His sister, Minjee Lee, is a two-time major winner on the LPGA Tour.