Munsingwear Ladies Tokai Classic Saturday: Sakura Yokomine and Na-Ri Kim Share the Lead

As Ji-Yai Shin was building a 3-shot lead in the KLPGA's 2nd major of 2010, the JLPGA's top gun, Sakura Yokomine, was finding it harder to distance herself from the star-studded field in the Munsingwear Ladies Tokai Classic. Even with 4 straight birdies to conclude her round, Yokomine found herself in a large group of 8 players within 3 shots of the lead, tied with ex-LPGAer Na-Ri Kim at the top of the heap at -9. Tomorrow's final round should be a treat, as no less than Yuri Fudoh, Momoko Ueda, Sun-Ju Ahn, Mi-Jeong Jeon, Inbee Park, Shinobu Moromizato, and Shiho Oyama remain within 5 shots of the lead.

Here's how the leaders and notables fared after round 2 was complete:

T1/-9 Na-Ri Kim (67-68), Sakura Yokomine (66-69)
3rd/-8 Yui Kawahara (71-65)
T4/-7 Ji-Woo Lee (71-66), Mayumi Shimomura (70-67), Mayu Hattori (69-68), Yuri Fudoh (68-69), Midori Yoneyama (66-71)
T9/-6 Mi-Jeong Jeon (70-68), Kuniko Maeda (69-69)

T11/-5 Sun-Ju Ahn (72-67), Shiho Oyama (70-69), Miki Saiki (70-69), Momoko Ueda (69-70), Shinobu Moromizato (69-70)
T17/-4 Esther Lee (73-67), Inbee Park (71-69)
T20/-3 Yukari Baba (73-68), Ayako Uehara (72-69), Li-Ying Ye (69-72), Na-Ri Lee (69-72)
T25/-2 Akiko Fukushima (74-68), Ah-Reum Hwang (74-68), Maiko Wakabayashi (73-69), Ritsuko Ryu (71-71), Bo-Bae Song (67-75)
T34/-1 Hyun-Ju Shin (75-68), Chie Arimura (72-71), Rui Kitada (70-73)
T40/E Yuko Mitsuka (74-70), Akane Iijima (71-73), Mie Nakata (71-73), Young Kim (69-75)
T49/+1 Yun-Jye Wei (76-69)

MC: Kaori Aoyama (76-70), Jae-Hee Bae (72-74), Asako Fujimoto (77-70), Yuki Ichinose (75-72), Teresa Lu (75-73), Rikako Morita (78-71), So-Hee Kim (76-74), Tamie Durdin (75-75), Erina Hara (74-76)

Veteran Yui Kawahara snagged the low round of the day and the tournament and she did it despite making 2 bogeys on the front 9. Ji-Woo Lee's 66, by contrast, was bogey-free, while both Mi-Jeong Jeon and Na-Ri Kim suffered double bogeys late on the front. Big numbers also hurt Bo-Bae Song, Ayako Uehara, and Li-Ying Ye, while Ueda, Moromizato, and Saiki played bogey-free golf.

Can't wait to see who minimizes their mistakes and takes advantage of their opportunities tomorrow!