Being a favorite to win a major championship, like Michelle Wie was this week at the U.S. Women’s Open Pinehurst No. 2, is usually more of a curse than a blessing.

It was especially daunting this week because of the USGA’s decision to play the tournament the week after the U.S. Men’s Open… on the same course. That brought more eyes to this women’s professional golf tournament than any in recent memory, making it all-the-more impressive that the 24-year-old was able to accomplish golf’s toughest feat.

Many expected her to win and she did. 

Pinehurst’s greens were firm, fast and repelled everything but the best-struck iron shots. That was a huge advantage for Wie, who is one of the few women on the LPGA Tour who has enough swing speed and skill to play muscleback irons (7-PW) and slightly more forgiving forged cavity-back middle irons (5, 6).

She has her 6-foot-1-inch frame and David Leadbetter-approved mechanics to thank for that, and she hit towering cut shots into Pinehurst’s turtleback greens that — unlike most of her competitors — stopped pretty much where they landed. That helped her hit 50 of 72 greens this week, about 11 more than the field’s average.

Click here to see photos of all the clubs Wie used to win the 2014 U.S. Women’s Open.

Wie also averaged 263.5 yards off the tee this week, which doesn’t sound that impressive until you consider her conservative style. In her closing nine holes she hit only one driver off the tee, opting to use her 13-degree Nike Covert 2.0 Tour fairway wood for most of her tee shots.

Those who know a little something about golf equipment also know that most LPGA Tour players don’t often use fairway woods with so little loft. They’re tough to elevate and even tougher to stop on the green. That’s why Wie said she uses the club mostly as slightly shorter, straighter option than her driver, but it’s what she said next that’s more impressive.

“I hardly ever have a shot into a green that’s more than 250 yards, so I don’t really ever have to hit it off the ground,” Wie said.

Why not have two driving clubs then?

And of course there’s Wie’s putting, which most golf analysts have targeted as her weakness and the reason why she hasn’t won the dozens of tournaments they expected from the golf prodigy when she was barely a teenager. It was the best club in her bag this week, though, which might have to do with something she picked up in her home state of Hawaii.

In April, she grabbed her third LPGA Tour victory at the Lotte Championship in Hawaii, but also picked up a ball marker adorned with the Hawaiian state flag. She hadn’t used it since then, but she used it to mark her ball this week. The results? No three putts and the most clutch putting performance of her career.

Could a lucky ball marker really have helped Wie win this week? A better question is this: What happens when one of the LPGA Tour’s best ball strikers starts putting better and feels more confident about her game?

That’s the funny thing about luck. Winners tend to have it; losers don’t.