Sunday, August 14, 2011

NEC Karuizawa 72 Sunday: Sun-Ju Ahn Beats Akiko Fukushima in Playoff

Sun-Ju Ahn solidified her position atop the JLPGA money list today with a playoff win over 1st- and 2nd-round leader Akiko Fukushima in the NEC Karuizawa 72. Ahn fired a bogey-free 66 in which she caught the 4-time champion in Nagano at -13 after 10 holes, then matched her birdie for birdie down the stretch as each golfer finished at -16. Unfortunately, I can't find any accounts in English of how Ahn got her 6th career JLPGA victory and 1st since the Salonpas Cup in May. So I'll have to settle for a rundown of the final results.

1st/-16 Sun-Ju Ahn (68-66-68) [won in playoff]
2nd/-16 Akiko Fukushima (66-66-68)
T3/-10 Na-Ri Kim (70-69-67), Sakura Yokomine (71-65-70)
5th/-9 Asako Fujimoto (69-69-69)
T6/-7 Bo-Bae Song (72-69-68), Ji-Hee Lee (72-66-71)
T8/-6 Chie Arimura (73-69-68), Shanshan Feng (72-68-70)
T10/-5 Teresa Lu (73-71-67), Ji-Yai Shin (71-72-68), Shiho Oyama (73-68-70), Midori Yoneyama (73-68-70)

T14/-4 Mi-Jeong Jeon (69-75-68), Li-Ying Ye (73-70-69), Saiki Fujita (71-70-71), Yukari Baba (71-69-72), Rikako Morita (71-69-72)
T21/-3 Eun-Bi Jang (74-71-68), Jae-Hee Bae (73-72-68), Bo-Mee Lee (73-70-70), Akane Iijima (73-70-70), Junko Omote (73-70-70), Esther Lee (70-71-72)
T28/-2 Ritsuko Ryu (71-73-70), Tamie Durdin (69-75-70), Young Kim (73-70-71), Onnarin Sattayabanphot (72-71-71), Hyun-Ju Shin (71-72-71), Eun-A Lim (75-67-72), Lala Anai (72-69-73)
T35/-1 So-Hee Kim (75-70-70), Shinobu Moromizato (70-71-74)
T39/E Rui Kitada (73-72-71)
T42/+1 Na-Ri Lee (73-72-72), Mayu Hattori (70-74-73), Kumiko Kaneda (73-70-74), Kaori Aoyama (72-70-75), Miki Uehara (72-70-75)
T51/+2 Miho Koga (72-73-73), Ji-Woo Lee (74-70-74), Maiko Wakabayashi (74-69-75)
T54/+3 Julie Lu (73-72-74), Nikki Campbell (70-74-75), Megumi Kido (72-71-76)
T58/+4 Ji-Na Lim (75-70-75)

As you can see, the cream of the JLPGA rose to the top, but nobody could keep up with Ahn and Fukushima. Still, Na-Ri Kim's T3 is very important to her, as she had been hanging on at #50 on the JLPGA money list. Others moved up the list thanks to their top-10 finishes, as well, although a late double kept Ji-Hee Lee from passing Miki Saiki and taking over the #2 spot:

1. Sun-Ju Ahn ¥67.02M
2. Miki Saiki ¥52.62M
3. Ji-Hee Lee ¥52.43M
4. Sakura Yokomine ¥50.79M
5. Chie Arimura ¥45.82M
6. Yuri Fudoh ¥36.32M
7. Hiromi Mogi ¥28.84M
8. Rui Kitada ¥28.06M
9. Ayako Uehara ¥25.31M
10. Inbee Park ¥24.33M
11. Kumiko Kaneda ¥22.63M
12. Bo-Bae Song ¥22.35M
13. Shanshan Feng ¥18.92M
14. Yukari Baba ¥17.83M
15. Mayu Hattori ¥17.47M
16. Saiki Fujita ¥16.39M
17. Asako Fujimoto ¥16.36M
18. Mi-Jeong Jeon ¥15.37M
19. Ji-Woo Lee ¥15.19M
20. Teresa Lu ¥15.07M
21. Bo-Mee Lee ¥14.65M
22. Shinobu Moromizato ¥14.33M
23. Hyun-Ju Shin ¥14.19M
24. Akiko Fukushima ¥14.17M
25. Ritsuko Ryu ¥13.90M
26. Momoko Ueda ¥13.77M
27. Eun-A Lim ¥13.68M
28. Rikako Morita ¥13.57M
29. Junko Omote ¥13.42M
30. Ah-Reum Hwang ¥12.92M
31. Na-Ri Lee ¥12.69M
32. Eun-Bi Jang ¥12.22M
33. Young Kim ¥12.01M
34. Ji-Yai Shin ¥11.91M
35. Shiho Oyama ¥11.81M
36. Na-Ri Kim ¥11.42M
37. Kaori Aoyama ¥11.13M
38. Soo-Yun Kang ¥11.09M
39. Esther Lee ¥10.95M
40. Miho Koga ¥10.67M
41. Akane Iijima ¥10.60M
42. So-Hee Kim ¥10.48M
43. Mie Nakata ¥10.25M
44. Nikki Campbell ¥10.11M
45. Yumiko Yoshida ¥9.65M
46. Yeo-Jin Kang ¥8.70M
47. Yuki Ichinose ¥8.16M
48. Megumi Kido ¥8.16M
49. Satsuki Oshiro ¥7.98M
50. Miki Sakai ¥7.48M

Fukushima has extra motivation to put today's disappointment behind her quickly, as she's the defending champion of the CAT Ladies. With none of the dual LPGA-JLPGA members in the field except Shiho Oyama, we could have another Ahn-Fukushima showdown next weekend!

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