Daikin Orchid Ladies Sunday: Inbee Park Picks Up Where She Left Off Last Season on the JLPGA

After playing the bridesmaid for most of her rookie season on the JLPGA, U.S. Women's Open champion Inbee Park kicked off her sophomore campaign with a come-from-behind win at the Daikin Orchid Ladies today. Her closing 66--sparked by a bogey-free 31 on the front--gave her her 2nd-straight JLPGA victory, dating back to the end of last year when she won the final event--and major--of the JLPGA season, the Ricoh Cup. Even as Park played impeccable golf--her only blemish came with a bogey on the par-3 13th, but she closed with 2 birdies in her last 3 holes for a 3-shot victory over Miki Saiki (68)--the leaders at the end of the 2nd round imploded. Saiki Fujita lost her chance for a wire-to-wire win by bogeying 4 of her last 6 holes to fall to -4, where Nikki Campbell had already fallen with a quadruple bogey on the par-5 11th and Lala Anai a bogey and double on the front and 3 bogeys in her last 4 holes after rattling off 3 birdies in the previous 4. And even though other players made charges--Bo-Bae Song fired a 7-birdie 67 and Kumiko Kaneda a 7-birdie 66--they started from too far back to block Park from her 3rd career JLPGA victory.

More details later this morning--I'm going back to bed!

[Update 1 (8:54 am): Here's how the leaders and notables finished:

1st/-11 Inbee Park (72-67-66)
2nd/-8 Miki Saiki (75-65-67)
T3/-7 Bo-Bae Song (72-70-67), Bo-Mee Lee (71-68-70)
T5/-6 Ji-Yai Shin (71-69-70), Rikako Morita (73-66-71)
T7/-5 Kumiko Kaneda (72-73-66), Akiko Fukushima (74-67-70), Momoko Ueda (71-67-73)
T10/-4 Mie Nakata (74-71-67), Yuri Fudoh (72-73-67), Akane Iijima (77-66-69), Hiromi Mogi (72-70-70), Sakura Yokomine (72-69-71), Lala Anai (70-67-75), Nikki Campbell (69-68-75), Saiki Fujita (67-69-76)

T18/-3 Ji-Woo Lee (73-73-67), Shanshan Feng (75-70-68), Ji-Na Lim (74-70-69)
T23/-2 Mi-Jeong Jeon (72-69-73), Meena Lee (74-66-74)
T26/-1 Yukari Baba (71-73-71), Chie Arimura (72-70-73), Shiho Oyama (72-69-74), Hee Young Park (72-69-74), Ah-Reum Hwang (72-68-75)
T31/E Asako Fujimoto (75-72-69), Onnarin Sattayabanphot (73-72-71), Miki Uehara (73-71-72), Na-Ri Lee (72-72-72), Yun-Jye Wei (74-68-74)
T38/+1 Asuka Tsujimura (76-69-72), Mika Takushima (71-73-73), Young Kim (74-68-75)
T42/+2 Ji-Hee Lee (73-73-72), Soo-Yun Kang (73-73-72)
T44/+3 Yuki Ichinose (74-71-74), Ayako Uehara (72-72-75), Sun-Ju Ahn (69-70-80)
T47/+4 Teresa Lu (75-72-73), Na-Ri Kim (75-71-74), Shinobu Moromizato (72-74-74)
T51/+5 Li-Ying Ye (73-72-76)
55th/+8 Jae-Hee Bae (76-71-77)
56th/+9 Kaori Aoyama (75-72-78)

Yikes! Defending champion Sun-Ju Ahn had 5 bogeys and 2 doubles on her way to the worst finish of her JLPGA career--it's her 1st outside the top 30 in her 28 starts on tour. Also falling off the pace was Momoko Ueda, who had 4 bogeys today, but at least she got a top 10. And a nice start to her JLPGA career by KLPGA standout Bo-Mee Lee, who finished ahead of world #2 Ji-Yai Shin in a tie for 3rd with Bo-Bae Song.]

[Update 2 (9:20 am): As you'd expect with only 1 event completed, here's what the top 20 on the new JLPGA money list looks like:

1. Inbee Park ￥14.40M
2. Miki Saiki ￥7.04M
3. Bo-Bae Song, Bo-Mee Lee ￥5.20M
5. Ji-Yai Shin, Rikako Morita ￥3.60M
7. Akiko Fukushima, Momoko Ueda, Kumiko Kaneda ￥2.40M
10. Yuri Fudoh, Sakura Yokomine, Akane Iijima, Saiki Fujita, Nikki Campbell, Hiromi Mogi, Mie Nakata, Lala Anai ￥1.28M
18. Junko Omote, Ji-Woo Lee, Shanshan Feng, Ji-Na Lim ￥.79M

Now time to check the field list for next week's event!]

[Update 3 (9:30 am): Very interesting! It's not yet out.]

[Update 4 (9:36 am): Someone should let the Korea Times know that Saiki Fujita and Miki Saiki are different people. Otherwise they did a decent job!]

[Update 5 (2:22 pm): Nice final-round write-up, complete results, and loads of photos from bangkokbobby!]

[Update 6 (10:50 pm): Those of you with reading knowledge of Japanese (or a better translation program than google's!) should bookmark Golf Digest Online, which is probably the best source on the JLPGA in Japanese.]