With surgery relieving pain in her body, Sacramento native Natalie Gulbis is feeling better than she has in a long time and golf is better for it
By Beth Ann Nichols
Natalie Gulbis can’t remember what it felt like to play without pain. She applied to the Stem Cell Institute of Panama to address ongoing thyroid issues three years ago after reading about Tony Robbins’ experience and got accepted in March. Two months after the procedure – which ultimately included injections into her back – she was over the moon about the results. And that was before the “golden cells” had even reached their peak.
“I don’t know what it will be like in a year or two years, but I feel absolutely amazing,” said Gulbis on the eve of her first LPGA start of 2025 in Mayakoba, Mexico, in May. “I usually feel good, but I do have pain, right? I’ve had four back surgeries, a hip operation. For 20 years, I’ve never seen a lot of range balls I didn’t want to hit. I don’t know exactly what it will feel like, but I know for right now, I haven’t felt this good in 15 years.”
Gulbis, 42, signed up for the stem-cell procedure not for golf reasons but for quality of life. She has long struggled with her thyroid, kidneys and liver. Cortisone injections and anti-inflammatories kept her going on a packed schedule that took her around the world.
“I think the first at least 15 years on tour, I didn’t say no to many things that would promote the game of golf,” says Gulbis. “I was always going to Japan, going to Dubai, Singapore, to this spot to that spot … it definitely caught up with me.”
Gulbis’ back surgeries weren’t done with her professional career in mind, but rather the ability to walk up a flight of stairs, sit in a movie or feel her left foot. She estimates that she’s played in around 650 professional events worldwide.
Before the pandemic hit, Gulbis announced that 2020 would be her final season on the LPGA. The 2007 Evian Masters winner and three-time Solheim Cup player has played sporadically since then but decided last winter at the TaylorMade Invitational at Pebble Beach that her final LPGA event would be in the spring of 2026 at the T-Mobile Match Play in Las Vegas, where she has many personal and professional ties.
Of course, that was before she got the call to Panama for a series of life-changing injections. She’s gone from being limited to an hour or two of practice each day to grinding anywhere from six to eight hours on the range. In addition to her tournament schedule, Gulbis also hosts a television destination series with Jimmy Hanlin called “Blaster’s 18 Holes.”
“I feel like I reversed at least 10 years,” says the energetic Gulbis, who feels neither pain nor stiffness when she rises each morning.
One of the most popular players on the LPGA this century, many believe Gulbis was unmatched in her time on tour when it came to how to treat people, from fans to sponsors to peers.
“She would give you the shirt off her back if she thought you needed it,” says two-time major winner and good friend Brittany Lincicome.
Tim Erensen, managing partner at Outlyr, which runs seven LPGA events, says Gulbis was always the one to say yes to doing extra, even if took away from her own preparations.
But don’t mistake her kindness for a lack of competitiveness.
“She’s not looking for a victory lap,” says Erensen.
Gulbis got her start in the game at Sunrise Golf Course in Citrus Heights, 15 miles northeast of the Golden State’s capital, a nine-hole public track that included a driving range. She’d sometimes play for free in the greater Sacramento area with her father, who received discounts as a member of law enforcement. Buckets of balls would be as cheap as $2.
For Gulbis, country club memberships weren’t an option.
“I grew up so much different than a lot of the girls that I know on tour,” says Gulbis, who played on the boys’ team at Granite Bay High School.
Playing a national junior schedule wasn’t in the family budget, so Gulbis was a regular on the NorCal junior golf circuit, with more than a dozen starts each season. Playing a junior tournament at Pebble Beach on Christmas Day began a love affair with the iconic course that never waned.
“I remember how they were run then, you know, to think about it now, it was amazing,” she says. “They always gave us a couple sleeves of golf balls and hats or head covers. Made a big barbecue lunch for us afterwards.
“Opening up the golf course – I know from having charity events how hard it is to get golf courses to give you the golf course, let alone for a junior golf event.”
Those open doors left a big impression on Gulbis, who began sponsoring her own Boys and Girls Club in southern Nevada 15 years ago. She’s been raising money for Boys and Girls Clubs in California and Nevada for 20 years. In the summertime, there are as many as 150 kids at her club anywhere from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
One reason Gulbis chose Vegas to play her final event is because there is no tournament near her hometown of Sacramento. From 1996 to 2010, there was an LPGA event not too far away at the Twelve Bridges Club in Lincoln and then later at Blackhawk Country Club in Danville. There hasn’t been an ongoing event in the San Francisco area since 2022.
Gulbis never stopped trying to get the tour back there.
“It’s a conversation that we have every single year with the tour – there has to be a fit here,” says Gulbis. “And there are so many incredible companies that are investing in women in business and women in sports that we need to find that kind of perfect matchup with somebody in tech, somebody in the financial sector in the Silicon Valley, San Francisco area that makes sense for us. Because you've got great golf courses.”
Not to mention, in Gulbis, the ideal host.