A Mostly Harmless Guide to Navigating the JLPGA Web Site (for Functional Illiterates Like Me)

The LPGA of Japan's web site is almost unnavigable to anyone without an elementary-school literacy level in Japanese--that is, to anyone who hasn't memorized a couple thousand kanji characters and is already a fluent reader of hiragana and katakana--because the JLPGA's leaders, in their infinite wisdom, provide barely any English translations on their site (unlike, say, the KLPGA's). On top of the language difficulty, though, is the JLPGA site's annoying tendency not to allow your browser to display (and hence copy/paste) internal URLs in the usual window in your navigation bar, such as to their 2008 schedule, their official money list, and so on. The best you can get is a quick glance at the URL when you scroll over it, but then only if your browser displays such information near the bottom of the page. (This method, by the way, will give you access to about 90% of the English on the entire site.) It's like they tried to take the LPGA.com stats database as their model for their entire site, but failed to hide the URLs of individual pages as well as the LPGA has.

So what someone functionally illiterate in Japanese needs is not only translations of players' names and key terms from Japanese into English, but links to the most basic information about them. That's where this post comes in.

LINK INDEX
2008 Schedule: This is the key link, as it lists winners of events played and defending champions of ones as-yet-unplayed, links to the generally nice-looking but information-poor tournament sites, and, most important, links to the results page for each event that is being or has been played. For the statistically-minded, the most interesting thing about each results page is in the right margin of the page, where the final results (最終成績) and round (日目) by round results (試合結果) and pairings (ペアリング) can be found. (Such results are available on the right margin of the main page, as well, but it only displays the most recent tournament's--a slight improvement on their "Realtime Scoring" link, which works only while the current tournament is being played.)

If you're interested in previous years' schedules going back to 1967, click here. You can turn any year's schedule page into a permalink by taking the basic link format (replace the "11_year_selector.asp" ending on the URL with "12_tour_list_ofayear.asp?yyyy=") and plugging in a year, like so. (Not much going on the year I was born, eh?)

Official Money List: I've linked to the 2008 list, but by changing the last 4 digits in the URL, you can produce a permalink to any year's list, going all the way back to 1968. If you don't need the permalink, using the in-page drop-down menu is quicker and easier, though. [Update 3/23/08: One nice feature of this money list is that a click on the player's name takes you to her profile page; if they did more than give her name in English, this would be the most useful page on the site.]

Career Money List: This link gives better information than most career money lists--it tells you, for instance, how many events the person has played in, not just how much money they have made, but like all career money lists I've ever seen, it fails to list the person's rookie year, which would allow you to compare classes and cohorts without doing a bunch of extra work.

Now, all this information is useless if you don't know who's who. So here's an alphabetical (in English) list of Japanese players' names (with links to their profiles), in kanji and katakana, along with their Rolex Ranking and position on the Golfweek/Sagarin Performance Index as of the first week of March 2008 (I'm stopping with the top 150 in each). I'll update this list as more people do well in tournaments this season.

NAME INDEX
Kaori Aoyama 青山 加織 （アオヤマ カオリ） #161 RR/#126 GSPI
Chie Arimura 有村 智恵 （アリムラ チエ） #60 RR/#84 GSPI
Yukari Baba 馬場ゆかり （ババ ユカリ） #101 RR/#83 GSPI
Tamie Durdin タミー ダーディン #110 RR/#125 GSPI
Yuri Fudoh 不動 裕理 （フドウ ユウリ） #17 RR/#9 GSPI
Saiki Fujita 藤田 幸希 （フジタ サイキ） #100 RR/#131 GSPI
Akiko Fukushima 福嶋 晃子 （フクシマ アキコ） #41 RR/#56 GSPI
Erina Hara 原 江里菜（ハラ エリナ） #55 RR/#120 GSPI
Mayu Hattori 服部 真夕 （ハットリ マユ） #163 RR/#79 GSPI
Michiko Hattori 服部 道子 （ハットリ ミチコ） #99 RR/#116 GSPI
Kaori Higo 肥後かおり （ヒゴ カオリ） #105 RR/#143 GSPI
Akane Iijima 飯島 茜　（イイジマ アカネ） #51 RR/#65 GSPI
Mi-Jeong Jeon 全 美 貞 (ｼﾞｮﾝ ﾐ ｼﾞｮﾝ) #22 RR/#36 GSPI
Yui Kawahara 川原 由維 （カワハラ ユイ） #77 RR/#63 GSPI
Toshimi Kimura 木村 敏美 （キムラ トシミ） #149 RR/#192 GSPI
Rui Kitada 北田 瑠衣 （キタダ ルイ） #95 RR/#213 GSPI
Nobuko Kizawa 鬼沢 信子 （キザワ ノブコ） #146 RR/#139 GSPI
Miho Koga 古閑 美保 （コガ ミホ） #43 RR/#45 GSPI
Ji-Hee Lee 李 知 姫 (ｲ ﾁ ﾋ) #61 RR/#87 GSPI
Eun-A Lim イム ウナ #87 RR/n.r. GSPI
Kuniko Maeda 前田久仁子 （マエダ クニコ） #103 RR/#92 GSPI
Yuko Mitsuka 三塚 優子 （ミツカ ユウコ） #54 RR/#115 GSPI
Ai Miyazato 宮里 藍 （ミヤザト アイ）#18 RR/#69 GSPI
Hiromi Mogi 茂木 宏美 （モギ ヒロミ） #70 RR/#74 GSPI
Shinobu Moromizato 諸見里しのぶ （モロミザト シノブ） #44 RR/#40 GSPI
Mie Nakata 中田 美枝 （ナカタ ミエ） #63 RR/#76 GSPI
Mikiyo Nishizuka 西塚美希世 （ニシヅカ ミキヨ） #94 RR/#105 GSPI
Michie Ohba 大場美智恵 （オオバ ミチエ） #135 RR/#163 GSPI
Namika Omata 小俣奈三香 （オマタ ナミカ） #90 RR/#88 GSPI
Shiho Oyama 大山 志保 （オオヤマ シホ） #24 RR/#33 GSPI
Miki Saiki 佐伯 三貴 （サイキ ミキ） #34 RR/#34 GSPI
Yasuko Satoh 佐藤 靖子 （サトウ ヤスコ） #182 RR/#122 GSPI
Yuko Saitoh 斉藤 裕子 （サイトウ ユウコ） #139 RR/#155 GSPI
Hyun-Ju Shin 辛 炫 周 (ｼﾝ ﾋｮﾝ ｼﾞｭ) #42 RR/#46 GSPI
[Update 3/21/08: Ji-Yai Shin 申　智　愛 (ｼﾝ ﾁ ｴ)]
Bo-Bae Song 宋 ボベ （ソン ボ ベ） #73 RR/#82 GSPI
Mihoko Takahashi 高橋美保子 （タカハシ ミホコ） #134 RR/#109 GSPI
Momoko Ueda 上田 桃子 （ウエダ モモコ） #12 RR/#7 GSPI
Ayako Uehara 上原 彩子 （ウエハラ アヤコ） #107 RR/#130 GSPI
Yun-Jye Wei ウェイ ユンジェ #65 RR/#132 GSPI
Hiroko Yamaguchi 山口 裕子 （ヤマグチ ヒロコ） #112 RR/#106 GSPI
Sakura Yokomine 横峯さくら （ヨコミネ サクラ） #20 RR/#29 GSPI
Midori Yoneyama 米山みどり （ヨネヤマ ミドリ） #83 RR/#137 GSPI
Na Zhang 張 娜 (ﾁｬﾝ ﾅ]) #21 RR/#55 GSPI