Monday, January 27, 2014

Around the World of Women's Golf in 3 Links

Jessica Korda won the opening event on the LPGA for the 2nd time in her career, beating Stacy Lewis with a walkoff birdie.  It's the 3rd time in the last few months that Lewis got beat when the 72nd hole was a par 5.  If she ever gets into course design, I'll bet we won't see many closing par 5s from her!  In addition to the golfers I focused on yesterday who made this one so exciting, it was great to see Brittany Lincicome start the year with 4-straight under-par rounds, former 1st alternate Amelia Lewis and Monday qualifier Jenny Suh tie her, Kristy McPherson, Alena Sharp, and Sandra Changkija finish at -10, Laura Diaz get a top 25, Moriya Jutanugarn (-7) and Caroline Masson (-4) renew their rivalry, and Seon Hwa Lee and Jennifer Song make it to the weekend.  The big disappointment of the week was Beatriz Recari (MC), but Ai Miyazato (E) and Lexi Thompson (-1) were in the running.

Joanna Klatten won on the ALPG with a final-round 63, passing Nikki Campbell, Hannah Burke, Stephanie Na, Min-Jee Lee, Kristie Smith, and Lindsey Wright.  Other names who made the cut included Julia Boland, Frances Bondad, Jessica Speechley, Sally Watson, Beth Allen, Laura Davies, Felicity Johnson, Sarah Kemp, Cathryn Bristow, Jacqueline Hedwall, Alison Whitaker, Valentine Derrey, Tamie Durdin, Gwladys Nocera, Anya Alvarez, Ashley Ona, Marta Silva, Stacey Keating, Jean Chua, and Sophie Gustafson.  So it was a pretty decent field.

Ya Ni Tseng won the Taifong Open on the TLPGA, beating the likes of Ruby Pan, Bo-Mi Suh, Ya-Huei Lu, Nontaya Srisawang, Min Lee, Titiya Plucksataporn, Wei-Ling Hsu, Phoebe Yao, Tiffany Tavee, Onnarin Sattayabanphot, Babe Liu, Tzu-Chi Lin, and Ye-Na Chung.  Not the strongest field in the world--or even the week--and she didn't go low, but a win's a win.  I'll take any positive news I can find about the former world #1 whom I predicted would return to the LPGA's top 20 this season.

2 comments:

Tony Jesselli (Tonyj5) said...

There is a huge difference in the importance of Klatten's and Yani's wins.

Klattens win on the Australian Tour is recognized in the calculations of the Rolex Rankings resulting in her moving up 27 spots this week.

Yani's win is not recognized, and as a result she actually fell 2 more spots this week to #41 in the RR.

The Constructivist said...

Good point, Tony!