Saturday, June 13, 2009

Futures Tour Players Championship Thursday and Friday: It's Major Time!

It's major time on the Futures Tour this week, and Amanda Blumenherst made her professional debut in style Thursday, as she shot the 2nd-best score of the day, a 68, behind only Sofie Andersson. But Friday was a different story, as her 76 dropped all the way from T2 to T34. With 54 players at E or better, Kim Welch can't take her foot off the gas pedal this weekend. After rounds of 68 and 69, she's only 2-up on Christi Cano, Lisa Ferrero, and Ashley Prange and 3-up on Onnarin Sattayabanphot, Sophia Sheridan, Gina Umeck, and Kylene Pulley. Lisa Mickey has more on the 1st 2 days. Here's how the leaders and notables stand with 36 holes left to play:

1st/-7 Kim Welch (68-69)
T2/-5 Ashley Prange (70-69), Christi Cano (69-70), Lisa Ferrero (69-70)
T5/-4 Sophia Sheridan (71-69), Onnarin Sattayabanphot (70-70), Gina Umeck (70-70), Kylene Pulley (70-70)
T9/-3 Mina Harigae (71-70), Misun Cho (71-70), Nicole Hage (69-72), Sofie Andersson (67-74)

T13/-2 Liz Janangelo (72-70), Alison Walshe (70-72), Pornanong Phatlum (69-73), Jane Chin (69-73)
T26/-1 Pernilla Lindberg (71-72), Cindy LaCrosse (70-73)
T34/E Maria Hernandez (73-71), Su A Kim (71-73), Nontaya Srisawang (70-74), Samantha Richdale (70-74), Amanda Blumenherst (68-76)
T55/+1 Jennie Lee (72-73), Hwanhee Lee (71-74)

Despite shooting a 75 yesterday, Hound Dog's fave and rare female lefty Malinda Johnson made the cut on the dot. Missing it were such fine players as Song Yi Choi, Dewi Claire Schreefel, Lucy Nunn, and Mallory Hetzel (by 1 shot), Stephanie Kim and Seo-Jae Lee (by 2), Naree Song, Violeta Retamoza, and Caroline Larsson (by 3), Hannah Jun (by 4), and Briana Vega, Angela Buzminski, and Hannah Yun (by more). Me, I'd love to see good weekends from my preseason picks still playing. Time for Sattayabanphot and Phatlum to make big moves up the money list. This tournament marks the end of the 1st half of the season--only 9 events left!

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