So Yeon Ryu's 31 and Lydia Ko's 33 on the front 9 at the Swinging Skirts World Ladies Masters helped vault them past world #1 Inbee Park, who followed up yesterday's 63 with a 76 today in Taiwan that included a double on the par-5 5th. When all the dust had settled, Ryu had the lead at -9, Ko was 1 shot behind her, and Park was 4 shots behind her.
Catriona Matthew had an even bigger swing, going from -7 yesterday to +7 today, which allowed the JLPGA's Lala Anai (71, -4), the LPGA's Na Yeon Choi (74, -3), Korea's Kyu Jung Baek (72, -3) and Soo Hwa Jang (73, -1), and Germany's Sandra Gal (76, -1) to pass her--and Sei Young Kim (70) and So Young Lee (74) to catch her at E. Matthew made 2 doubles in her round, while Gal tripled the par-4 9th. KLPGA money-list leader and Player of the Year Ha Na Jang would have been among those passing Matthew, but she, too, took a big number, this time a double on the par-5 18th, to drop to +1 at the halfway point, tied with her rival and KLPGA Rookie of the Year Hyo Joo Kim (73).
It was no prettier for the rest of the field. Paula Creamer eagled the par-5 2nd but bogeyed 4 of her last 10 holes to drop back to +2 for the week, tied with Ya Ni Tseng, who made 2 doubles on her way to a disappointing 78. But she shouldn't be too disappointed, as most of the big names had big problems today and thus far this week: Caroline Hedwall (78, +3), Ji-Yai Shin (77, +3), Chella Choi (75, +3), Ha Neul Kim (76, +4), Jessica Korda (73, +4), Anna Nordqvist (78, +5), Hee Young Park (77, +6), Bo-Mee Lee (77, +6), Shin Ae Ahn (77, +6), In-Kyung Kim (73, +6), Teresa Lu (78, +8), Beatriz Recari (78, +9), Belen Mozo (77, +8), Ayako Uehara (78, +9), Brittany Lincicome (74, +9). Ouch!
It looks like it was just one of those (very very windy) days for 98% of the field (the JLPGA's Natsuka Hori, who admittedly had been having a tough 2nd half of the season but still finished in the top 10 on their money list, shot an 88--and it wasn't even the worst score of the day!). Which makes what Ryu and Ko did today even more impressive. Ryu's 67 and Ko's 68 were the only sub-70 rounds of the day; only 4 other golfers even got under par. And we're talking some of the best of the LPGA, JLPGA, KLPGA, and LET!
Ah, well, there's always tomorrow!
3 comments:
Hi Bruce,
It's a 54 Hole 3 round tournament so past the halfway point. Lydia Ko mentioned recently she has not had the honour of playing a round with Inbee Park yet at a tournament so today regardless of how the final round goes it will be a great experience for her. With So Yeon Ryu also in the final group to tee off and looking at the scores it's hard to see the winner not coming from one of these three. Can our young Lydia keep her nerve and not be intimidated by these two champions? It's an unforgiving course if you don't keep to the fairways as the scores show. Go Ko!!
Oh, the leaderboard had space for 4 rounds, so I figured Monday finish? That makes a whole lot more sense! Let's see if Lydia can do in Taiwan what Pornanong accomplished in Dubai!
It was very windy yesterday with some very strong gusts so there was an element of luck and excuses for some of the poor shots. Hopefully conditions are better today but it looks too late for anyone outside Park, Ko and Ryu not withstanding the fact that rest of the field are looking at trying to catch the world #1,5 and 6. It was a great win by Pornanong to come from behind I just hope that all these players successfully chasing Stacey down does not get to her because she is still playing some great consistent golf.
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