Latanna Stone during Monday qualifying for the 2026 Orlando Health Championship (Photo: Isaiah Bell/Epson Tour)
The Epson Tour pulls into Lakeland this week with a lot already written into the 2026 season’s early pages. Two events down. Two different champions. And now 120 players descend on Grasslands Golf & Country Club for what is officially — and for the first time — the Orlando Health Championship.
This isn’t just another tournament. It’s the last chance for points before the calendar goes dark for four weeks. It’s the third and final stop of the Florida swing. And for at least one player in the field, it’s something far more personal than any leaderboard number could capture.
First round tees off Friday, March 20. The women on the Road to the LPGA know what that means.
A New Name, A New Venue
The Orlando Health Championship is an inaugural event on the 2026 Epson Tour calendar — one of two new additions to the schedule this season. Played at Grasslands Golf & Country Club in Lakeland, Florida, it features a competitive 120-player field vying for a $250,000 purse. The champion will claim $37,500 and 500 vital Race for the Card points.
Grasslands is a classic central Florida layout. Par 72, 6,528 yards from the whitelines. The front nine plays slightly shorter at 3,230 yards; the back opens up to 3,298. The 18th is a 553-yard par five that will likely decide a few fates over 54 holes, and the 132-yard 10th is a postage stamp that punishes anyone who drifts even slightly offline. In Florida in late March, the wind doesn’t ask permission — it just shows up.
No spectator at home should be surprised if scores stay tighter than expected. Grasslands rewards patience and penalizes the greedy. Players who go hunting for birdies on holes that aren’t offering them tend to drop shots in bunches.
The Race for the Card Context
Before we talk personalities, understand what this week means structurally. This tournament serves as the final event of the season’s opening swing before a four-week break. Whatever a player carries into that gap, she carries into May and June and the second half of a season that will eventually produce 15 LPGA Tour cards. Points earned now don’t disappear, but the gap between the haves and the have-nots widens every week the tour isn’t playing.
Missing a cut here, or finishing outside the top 40, is a missed opportunity that cannot be recovered on a week the tour goes dark. The players understand the math. They don’t need it explained.
The Momentum Leaders
The Race for the Card standings entering Lakeland reveal just how compressed the early-season battle already is — and how much this week could shake things up.
Annabelle Pancake-Webb arrives as the highest-ranked player in the field, sitting fifth overall with 294 points. The Zionsville, Indiana native has been one of the steadier presences on tour through the opening two events, and a strong week at Grasslands could push her into the top three of the overall standings heading into the four-week break.
Right behind her is a cluster of players who know that 500 points are sitting on the table and that the difference between fifth and fifteenth on the Race for the Card could come down to one weekend in Lakeland. Kaitlyn Papp Budde sits sixth at 250 points. Maria Fassi — one of the most recognizable names in the field — is seventh at 243. Mariel Galdiano is eighth at 230, and Kaleiya Romero is ninth at 196.
Fassi is worth watching closely. The Mexican star has the power game to handle Grasslands’ longer holes, particularly that 553-yard closing par five, and she’s the kind of player whose name on a Saturday leaderboard tends to draw attention.
Romero, a San Jose native and 2025 rookie, has been climbing steadily. Her 9th-place standing heading into just the third event of the season signals she’s ahead of schedule on the card chase.
Further down the list, Amari Avery (13th, 115 pts), Gianna Clemente (17th, 94 pts), and Megan Schofill (19th, 81 pts) are all confirmed in the field and all within striking distance of a significant standings jump. For Clemente and Schofill especially — both Florida players competing essentially on home turf — the combination of local comfort and standings incentive makes them dangerous.
A winner this week vaults straight into contention at the top of the Race for the Card. Players sitting in the 10-20 range right now understand that a top-10 finish at Grasslands could be the move that defines their season.
The Rookie Who Has More Than Golf on Her Mind
The story that cuts through the noise this week belongs to Rylee Suttor.
Suttor is a rookie. She started her collegiate career at Centre College, a Division III program in Kentucky, initially expecting that to be the ceiling. She got to college and realized she really loved golf and wanted to pursue it as a career, which led her to transfer to the University of Louisville. Division I. Better facilities, tougher competition, a new coaching staff. She made it work.
After Louisville, she turned professional. The plan was simple: head to Orlando, spend the winter with her mom, practice in the Florida warmth, and prepare for the Epson Tour grind. Then October happened.
Her mom called while Suttor was on the Bermuda chipping green at the back facility at Louisville. The news: a cancer diagnosis. Surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy to follow.
Her mom was treated at Orlando Health.
Suttor says it means a great deal to play in an event tied to the sponsor that helped her mom through so much — they handled everything from surgery to chemo to radiation, and even provided therapists and additional support resources. She’s here this week on a contractual sponsor invite. Her mother will be watching.
Suttor describes it as a full-circle moment — one that reminds her life is bigger than golf, and that building relationships is the main goal, not just playing.
There’s no competitive playbook for what she’s carrying into the first tee on Friday. But there’s a clear reason to root for her this week that has nothing to do with strokes gained.
The Grinders Who Earned Their Way In
Not everyone in this field got here through points or status. Two players earned their spots the hard way.
Latanna Stone carded an impressive 1-under 71 to earn medalist honors in Monday’s local qualifier. Carley Cox Pruette sank a 15-foot birdie putt in a three-way playoff to secure her spot in the main field.
Stone lives in Riverview — roughly 50 minutes from Grasslands. She had missed Monday qualifying at the two previous events, so closing it out this time gave her a lot of confidence heading into the week. Her husband won’t be in the gallery — he’s standing up in a friend’s wedding — but family and friends will be on-site, and she knows this course is as close to a home game as the Epson Tour offers.
In her own words, it’s the opportunity that’s been motivating her: just to get back out there and play.
The Monday qualifier itself is relatively new. The Epson Tour introduced an 18-hole stroke-play local qualifying round this year for select events, including the Atlantic Beach Classic, the IOA Golf Classic, and now the Orlando Health Championship, accommodating up to 36 Epson Tour Professional Members in priority order from the 2026 Priority List. It’s a small but meaningful structural addition — one that gives players outside the top 80 a fighting chance to compete and earn points when they’re playing well enough to deserve it.
A Field With Florida Roots
The Orlando Health Championship naturally draws a Florida-heavy field. Ten players in the field are Florida residents or natives, including Kaley Amuso, Lauren Clark, Gianna Clemente, Sarah Edwards, Daniela Iacobelli, Amelia Lewis, Katherine Muzi, Megan Schofill, Latanna Stone, and Samantha Wagner.
Clemente is one of 17 rookies in the field and currently sits 17th in the Race for the Card with 94 points through two events — a strong early-season showing for a player just starting her professional career. She finished Final Qualifying ranked 27th and is exactly the kind of young Florida talent this week was built to spotlight.
The full field spans multiple countries, with 64 Americans, seven Canadians, and six players from the Philippines, among others — 120 competitors all pushing toward the same narrow door at the end of the season.
Why the Epson Tour Matters Right Now
At the end of the 2026 Epson Tour season, the top 15 players on the Race for the Card leaderboard earn LPGA Tour membership. Fifteen cards. One year of work. Every shot counts.
This week’s 500 points for the winner are significant at any stage of the season. In March, with players like Fassi, Galdiano, Romero, and Papp Budde all separated by fewer than 65 points in the standings, one weekend at Grasslands could reshuffle the entire early-season hierarchy before anyone takes a breath during the four-week break.
The players chasing that card know exactly where they stand. They’ve checked the leaderboard. They know the math. What they need now is 54 holes at Grasslands Golf & Country Club to go their way.
There are no free passes on the Road to the LPGA. You earn what you get.
How to Follow the 2026 Orlando Health Championship
Live Scoring: Epson Tour website and the LPGA App
Social Media: Follow @EpsonTour on X and Instagram for on-course updates; follow @FairwayQueens for coverage and analysis throughout the week; use #OrlandoHealthChamp and #Road2LPGA to track the conversation
Format: 54-hole stroke play; cut to the top 60 and ties after 36 holes
Dates: Friday, March 20 – Sunday, March 22
Venue: Grasslands Golf & Country Club, Lakeland, Florida
Purse: $250,000 | Winner’s Share: $37,500
