Mizuno Classic Weekend: Mi Hyang Lee Prevails in Classic Barnburner

21-year-old Mi Hyang Lee won the 2nd tournament of 2014 among major women's professional tours by firing a final-round 63 in New Zealand and blowing past Lydia Ko, among others.  And she's just won the Mizuno Classic, the 2nd of November--and her 1st on the LPGA--by blowing past 51-year-old Laura Davies, among others, catching Ilhee Lee and Kotomo Kozuma at -11, and beating them with a birdie on the 5th playoff hole.  With 9 players finishing at -10 and 5 at -9, it's amazing that Lee could prevail, but somebody had to do it.  Here's how it happened.

Lee had sprung into contention with a 2nd-round 67, but it wasn't nearly the best round on moving day.  The JLPGA's young star Ai Suzuki birdied her last 4 holes in a row (and 5 of her last 6) for a 64 that got her a share of the lead with Davies (67) and Ilhee Lee (66) at -9.  Na-Ri Lee birdied 6 of her last 11 holes to post a 65 that got her into solo 7th, 2 shots off the lead and 1 behind Mi Hyang Lee, Kozuma (67), and Chella Choi (68).  With Jessica Korda, Misuzu Narita, and Teresa Lu firing 67s of their own to move to -6, -5, and -4, respectively, and with big names Karrie Webb (68), Sakura Yokomine (69), and Bo-Mee Lee (69) lurking, Sunday dawned with 21 players within 5 shots of the lead.  The only disappointment was that the 2 biggest names in the field, LPGA money-list leader Stacy Lewis and JLPGA money-list leader Sun-Ju Ahn, were not in that group.

Even without them in the hunt, what a Sunday it turned out to be!  Hall of Famer and 2006 champion Webb kicked off the festivities with a bogey-free 31 on the front from the 3rd-to-last group to move to -11 at the turn.  Playing in the next-to-last group, Choi and Mi Hyang Lee birdied 4 of her 1st 7 holes and 3 of her 1st 7, respectively, to join her.  Meanwhile Korda, sandwiched between those 2 groups, got it to -10 with a birdie-free 32 on the front.  But all of them were chasing Choi's and Lee's playing partner Kozuma, who birdied 4 holes in a row after parring the 1st and got it to -13 with a birdie on the par-5 7th.  As the 2nd-round co-leaders stumbled out of the gates--Suzuki bogeyed her 1st 2 holes and scrambled her way to a 37 that left her at -8, Davies offset her 2 birdies with 2 bogeys to stay at -9, and Ilhee Lee made 11-straight pars dating back to the end of moving day before making her lone birdie on the front that got her to -10--Kozuma suddenly gave everyone hope with bogeys on 9 and 11 that dropped her back to -11.

Even as the 22-year-old looking for her 1st JLPGA victory looked like she was starting to fumble it, other players entered the fray.  LPGA newbie Ayako Uehara, a 3-time winner on the JLPGA who was a fixture in the top 26 of their money list from 2006 to 2012, ended her 8-hole par train that closed out yesterday's round with a birdie on her 1st hole today and followed it up with 4 more in her next 12 holes of bogey-free golf to climb to -11 and into a tie for the lead with her playing partner Korda (who birdied the 12th to get there), Choi (who would follow up her birdie barrage on the 1st 7 holes with a par train over her next 7), Kozuma, and Ilhee Lee (who birdied the 7th and 11th to get there and had gone without a bogey for 33 holes and counting at that point).  But what of Webb, Davies, and the eventual winner?  Well, Webb went bogey-birdie-bogey to fall back to -10 with only 4 holes left to play, Mi Hyang Lee had bogeyed the 10th to join her there but fought back into a tie for the lead with a birdie on the 14th, and Davies birdied the par-5 13th to get to -10.

A bunch of late charges complicated matters yet further.  1st-round leader Morgan Pressel, who had stalled Saturday after an opening 67 due to an unexpectedly balky putter, followed up her bogey-free 33 on the front today with 3 birdies in her last 6 holes, including 2 in her last 3, to post her 2nd 67 of the week and become the leader in the clubhouse at -10.  She was joined a few minutes later by playing partners Sakura Yokomine and Saiki Fujita.  Yokomine had birdied 2 of her 1st 3 holes but stalled midway through her round, yet finished strong with 4 birdies in her last 8 holes, including 3 of her last 6.  Fujita, meanwhile, followed up her 4 birdies in her 1st 6 holes with a lone eagle on the 13th in a sea of pars.  Their final playing partner, Harukyo Nomura, had a great chance to become the 4th co-leader in the clubhouse, but despite making 5 birdies between the 7th and 15th holes, could not make another on the 540-yard par-5 16th, 180-yard par-3 17th, or 405-yard par-4 18th.

So the big question as the leaders entered the home stretch was who would join Pressel, Yokomine, and Fujita at -10--and who would surpass them?

The 1st to try was Webb.  She made a heroic birdie on 17 to get to -11, but had to settle for becoming the 4th co-leader in the clubhouse when she suffered a walkoff bogey.

Next up were Korda, Uehara, and Na-Ri Lee.  Korda had fallen back to -10 with a bogey on the par-4 14th and couldn't make a birdie coming home.  Lee did birdie 2 of her last 4 holes, but it was too little, too late.  So all Uehara needed to do to pass the 6 co-leaders was to stay at -11.  She did it with pars on 14, 15, 16, and 17, but she couldn't do it on 18.  Now there were 7 players at -10 and only 6 left on the course.  Would anyone break the logjam?

The next threesome featured up-and-coming golfers looking for their 1st win ever (Choi and Kozuma) or 1st win on the LPGA (Mi Hyang Lee).  Kozuma had righted the ship after her mid-round stumbles and had made 6-straight pars as she headed into the 18th at -11.  Lee had followed up her birdie on 14 with 3-straight pars to keep pace with the JLPGA's last hope for a homegrown winner.  But Choi had bogeyed the par-4 15th and needed a birdie on 18 or walkoff bogeys by her playing partners to have a hope of winning.  In the end, all 3 parred out, making it 8 golfers at -10--and 2 at -11.

Would anyone in the final group be able to beat Lee and Kozuma?  Davies couldn't do it, as she finished with 5-straight pars to become the 9th player to end the week at -10.  After her rough start, Suzuki had fought back to -9 with 2 holes to play, but parred out.  Ilhee Lee got it to -12 with a birdie on the long par-5 16th, but she ended her 38-hole bogey-free run with a bogey on 17.  Could she birdie 18 for the win?  Would she join Webb and Uehara in the walkoff bogey club?  Nope, she parred it to join the playoff with Kozuma and Mi Hyang Lee.

And what a playoff it was!  They played the tough 18th over and over...and over.  All pars the 1st go-round...and the 2nd.  All birdies the 3rd.  All pars the 4th.  Finally Mi Hyang Lee prevailed with her 2nd birdie of the playoff on the 5th go-round!

If you had told me at the start of the week that Stacy Lewis, Na Yeon Choi, and Sun-Ju Ahn would finish outside the top 30 and Bo-Mee Lee, Ji-Yai Shin, Misuza Narita, Teresa Lu, and Mirim Lee would struggle to make the top 20, I would have told you that anyone could walk away with the victory (and that I'd be in contention for the wooden spoon, the cellar-dweller's prize in SeoulSisters.com's PakPicker, this week!).  In the midst of Morgan Pressel, Chella Choi, and Na-Ri Lee putting on a ball-striking exhibition, Ai Suzuki and Ayako Uehara putting on a putting exhibition, and Laura Davies and Karrie Webb showing the kids a thing or two, Mi Hyang Lee, Ilhee Lee, and Kotono Kozuma showed us all that you don't need to have a big name or a huge resume to create a lot of drama.  Mi Hyang Lee's 2nd win of 2014 will move her up my ranking of the top 22 under 22 on major women's professional tours.  Congratulations to Lee and condolences to everyone she surpassed!

[Update 1 (5:39 am):  Sunday was a day of playoffs, as Min Sun Kim broke through for her 1st career KLPGA victory and Lee-Anne Pace made it 3 Ws in her last 3 starts!]

Canadian Pacific Women's Open Sunday: So Yeon Ryu Holds Off Na Yeon Choi for 3rd Career LPGA Victory

So Yeon Ryu pulled 1 shot ahead of Na Yeon Choi at the end of the 1st round of the Canadian Pacific Women's Open with a walkoff birdie that got her to -9.  For the next 45 holes, it looked like Ryu's only competition would Annika Sorenstam's feat of -27 for 72 holes, as she made 16 birdies and only 1 bogey to move to -24 with 9 holes left to play.  At that point she was 6-up on Choi, 7-up on Inbee Park, and 9-up on Azahara Munoz.  The only question seemed to be whether Ryu would beat Annika's mark and whether Park would play the entire tournament bogey-free.

The answer to both questions, however, turned out to be no.  Park's bogey-free run would end after 64 holes when she missed a makeable par save on the par-4 11th.  And then NYC cut SYR's lead in half after Ryu bogeyed 10 and Choi birdied the 11th and the par-3 13th.  And when NYC birdied the par-4 15th and SYR bogeyed it, they were right back on the 70th tee where they had last been on the 19th:  1 stroke apart.  And when Ryu had to lay up on the par-5 16th and Choi had a chance to go for the green in 2, that single stroke seemed a very slim margin indeed.  But when NYC pushed her approach into the right bunker and SYR stuck her wedge to about 8 feet, you could feel the tables start to turn.  And when Choi couldn't get the sandie and Ryu hit a perfect putt to fight back to -23, you could almost hear the click.  2 pars later for each golfer and everyone on the course could hear it.  Ryu had won for the 3rd time on the LPGA and 1st time since 2012.

The announcers made a big deal about both Ryu and Choi being Inbee Park's bridesmaids at her October 2014 wedding, so let me make the obligatory "no longer a bridesmaid" comment.  The Park connection I'm more interested in, however, is the notion of a U.S. Women's Open jinx.  Park lost the top spot in the Rolex Rankings after winning last year's USWO and didn't win again until the Manulife (where she also ended up at -23!), which is actually a mild form of the jinx.  Paula Creamer, for instance, had to wait for her 10th career LPGA victory almost 4 years after winning the USWO at Oakmont.  (Park herself had to wait about as long for her 2nd LPGA victory after winning the USWO for the 1st time in 2008).  Admittedly, the comparison isn't exact, as both SYR and NYC have exactly 1 LPGA win since taking their own USWO titles in 2011 and 2012, respectively.  So let's call it a delayed-reaction USWO jinx.  In any case, it's over for So Yeon Ryu.

So congratulations to Ryu on a long-awaited and much-deserved victory.  And congratulations to Kim Kaufman, who fired the low round of the day, a bogey-free 66 that included a 3-putt par on the 16th.  She went -11 over her last 35 holes of bogey-free golf and hit every green but 9.  And congratulations, as well, to Danielle Kang, who tied Kaufman for 5th at -15 and looked like she was having a total blast the entire week.  Caroline Masson and Kristy McPherson, who tied NYC's 67 for the 2nd-lowest rounds of the day, also deserve much congratulations.

As happy as I am for Ryu and the gang, I'm just as sad for Ai Miyazato, who seemed to have turned a corner with her 2nd-round 67, but who tied Sue Kim for the high round of the day today and was +7 over her final 23 holes.  The stats make it seem her putter let her down on moving day and she spent a lot of time in the rough during the final round.  Hope she shakes it off quickly, as the Evian is her best chance to win her 1st LPGA major!  I was hoping for better from Mina Harigae (-2), Jane Park (-2), Tiffany Joh (-1), and Ayako Uehara (+1) this week, as well.  At least Harukyo Nomura (-8) and Chie Arimura (-6) had pretty solid weeks.  Here's hoping they play well in Portland next week!

Move Over, Rory! Kylie Walker Fires 3-Straight 64s on LET

Charley Hull has shot a pair of 64s in Germany on the LET this week, but trails leader Kylie Walker by 6 shots.  Yup, Scotland's 27-year-old rising star, who's won once already this year and is #22 on the tour's Order of Merit, shot 3--count 'em, 1, 2, 3--64s in a row.  How's she done it?  She's birdied half the holes she's played thus far this week.

Granted, this is not Royal Liverpool, and lots of players are going low--Yu Yang Zhang is also -18, Anne-Lise Caudal and Celine Herbin are -16, Amy Boulden is -15, Sandra Gal and Carlota Ciganda are -14, and a total of 20 players are double digits under par already--but in the midst of a historic week by Rory McIlroy, a crowded and diverse leaderboard on the LPGA, and chances for a 3rd win in 2014 by Misuzu Narita on the JLPGA and Kyu-Jung Baek on the KLPGA, but I hope that the non-bloggy media picks up on this story.

I can't remember a player ever doing what Walker's done.  Can you?  Think she has any hope of making it 4 in a row?

North Texas LPGA Shootout Friday: Meena Lee and Stacy Lewis Set Pace with 64s

Meena Lee started her 2nd round with an eagle on the par-5 10th and never looked back as she posted a 64 to catch Caroline Masson at -8 atop the leaderboard of the North Texas LPGA Shootout.  Masson, who just missed being LPGA Rookie of the Year in 2013, fired her 2nd-straight 5-birdie 67 on the par-71 Las Colinas course, but her consistent excellence was overshadowed by the pyrotechnics of a host of her competitors.

Lee never made a par on the back (her front), following up her opening eagle with a bogey, 2 birdies, another bogey, 3 birdies, and a bogey--and then capping it off with a 3-hole birdie train on a bogey-free front (her back).  Stacy Lewis, meanwhile, drove for show (over 317 yards off the tee!) and putted for dough (only 26 putts on a day she missed only 3 greens) as she put together a bogey-free 64 less than 24 hours after one of her worst putting rounds in the last several years.  And guess who's right with her there at -7?  None other than Natalie Gulbis, who fired an 8-birdie 65 yesterday (also with 15 greens and only 26 putts).  And matching Suzann Pettersen's low round from Thursday were Julieta Granada, Dewi Claire Schreefel, Kim Kaufman, and Tiffany Joh.

So who cares if Pettersen and Cristie Kerr stalled a little bit today, Michelle Wie fell back a little, Lexi Thompson and Angela Stanford continued to be stuck in neutral, and In-Kyung Kim withdrew?  I'm on cloud 9 because New Yorkers Laura Diaz (67) and Moira Dunn (68), youngsters Mina Harigae (68) and Jennifer Song (69), and superstars Inbee Park (68) and Na Yeon Choi (69) all made major moves up the leaderboard.  Yes, I'm down that Morgan Pressel, Hee Young Park, Jeong Jang, Lizette Salas, and Chie Arimura all missed the cut by a shot, and sad for Catriona Matthew, Seon Hwa Lee, Karin Sjodin, Louise Friberg, Laura Davies, and Se Ri Pak, who missed it by more.  But when surprises like Masson, Gulbis, Christina Kim, Granada, Schreefel, Dori Carter, Dunn, Megan McChrystal, Thidapa Suwannapura, Katherine Kirk, and Felicity Johnson are hanging with the big girls--including Azahara Munoz, Pornanong Phatlum, and Jenny Shin--it just goes to show how deep the LPGA is.

So basically anything can happen this weekend.  Too bad I'm too busy to stay over with my folks on the way back from Albany and watch a little bit of the action tomorrow before I get back to Hamburg!

Congratulations to Anna Nordqvist, Lexi Thompson, Ayaka Watanabe, and Kendall Dye!

Anna Nordqvist's 4th LPGA victory (and 2nd in her last 4 starts!) last Sunday vaulted her to #12 among those to enter the LPGA since 2005, while Lexi Thompson's 3rd-place finish pushed her past the $2M barrier in career winnings and kept her at #10 in my career ranking system.

Congratulations are also in order to 1st-time winners on the JLPGA and Symetra Tour, Ayaka Watanabe and Kendall Dye, respectively.  Both poured it on down the home stretch, Watanabe by making up a 5-shot gap in 5 holes courtesy of a birdie-birdie-eagle finish and Dye by blowing past Hannah Yun with a 4-birdie, 1-eagle run in her 1st 7 holes on the back.

AXA Ladies Sunday: 20-Year-Old Ayaka Watanabe Secures 1st JLPGA Victory with Birdie-Birdie-Eagle Finish

For most of the day today at the AXA Ladies, the final pairing and the entire final round looked like a victory lap for 28-year-old Saiki Fujita.  Her 2-shot lead on 20-year-old Ayaka Watanabe through 36 holes had grown to 5 by the time the final pairing reached the 4th tee and even a double bogey on the 356-yard par-4 6th--her 1st blemish since Friday, bringing her total to 1 bogey, 1 double, and 1 eagle for the week--only seemed to spur her on to even better golf, as she birdied her next 3 holes in a row to post a 33 on the front anyway.

So what if Watanabe bounced back with 2 late birdies to return to -8 or Bo-Mee Lee birdied 3 of her last 4 holes on the front to move to -9?  Fujita was -13 and cruising, with a gigantic 8-shot lead on hometown hero and 18-year-old Asuka Kashiwabara to boot.  And after matching Watanabe's and Kashiwabara's birdies on the 178-yard par-3 13th, Fujita's lead was 5 on Lee and Watanabe and 8 on Kashiwabara with only 5 holes left to play.  The only question seemed to be whether she'd get her 1st win in almost 3 years with 3 straight 67s or not.

But then Fujita bogeyed the 379-yard par 4 14th even as Kashiwabara birdied it and she lead Lee and Watanabe by 4 with 4 to play and Kashiwabara by 6.

And then she bogeyed the 388-yard par-4 15th right after Lee had birdied it.  Now it was only 2 on Lee with 3 to play, but at least it was still 3 on Watanabe and 5 on Kashiwabara, right?

Wrong.  Watanabe and Kashiwabara cut it to 2 and 4, respectively, with matching birdies on the 162-yard par-3 16th.  Then Watanabe followed it up with another birdie, this time on the 383-yard par-4 17th, to pull within 1 of Fujita and pass Lee, who had bogeyed it just minutes earlier to fall 3 shots off the pace.  So the only player Fujita had to worry about as they came to the tee of the 505-yard par 5 was Watanabe.  All Fujita had to do was birdie it to secure her 6th career JLPGA victory.

Instead, she bogeyed it.  And Watanabe eagled it!  Watanabe had turned a 5-shot deficit into 2-shot victory in a mere 5 holes!  Now that's how to make your 1st-ever JLPGA victory memorable!

What makes Watanabe's win even more impressive is that she had missed the cut badly the week before at the T-Point Ladies.  Just 8 days later, she joined the youth movement that's been redefining the JLPGA the last couple of years.  And she leaped to the 2nd spot on the 2014 JLPGA money list:

1. Onnarin Sattayabanphot ￥24.11M

2. Ayaka Watanabe ￥20.91M
3. Rikako Morita ￥20.42M

4. Yuki Ichinose ￥15.25M

5. Erina Hara ￥12.35M

6. Bo-Mee Lee ￥11.89M

7. Saiki Fujita ￥10.45M

8. Mami Fukuda ￥9.53M
9. Miki Sakai ￥9.17M

10. Asako Fujimoto ￥8.51M
11. Ji-Yai Shin ￥8.04M

12. Bo-Bae Song ￥6.91M

13. Mamiko Higa ￥6.88M

14. Airi Saitoh ￥6.67M

15. Sun-Ju Ahn ￥6.49M

Rui Kitada, whose bogey-free 69 enabled her to catch Kashiwabara in a tie for 4th at -8, is in the next spot after Ahn, while Asako Fujimoto and Erina Hara, who finished in T7 at -6 (1 shot behind Lala Anai and 1 ahead of defending champion Natsuka Hori) bring the total to 9 Japanese players at 26 or younger in the top 15 of the money list--and 7 under 25!  One of them, Okinawa's own Mamiko Higa, will be defending her title next week at the Yamaha Ladies.  The KLPGA's Hyo-Joo Kim will be one of the visiting players in the field.  Let's see if a Korean young gun can stop the Japanese young guns from running wild in the early stages of 2014.

[Update 1 (11:10 pm):  You have to watch this video of Watanabe's finish!  Her birdie on 17 came from an awesome approach from a fairway bunker and her eagle was a chip-in!

Amazing!]

[Update 2 (11:26 pm):  This video covers the entire final hole plus the aftermath.  Thanks to my anonymous commenter for both links!]

World Ladies Championship Saturday: World #1 Inbee Park Catches #2 Suzann Pettersen at -18 with 62

OK, I'm a huge JLPGA fan and still believe it's the 2nd-best women's professional tour, behind the LPGA and ahead of the KLPGA and LET.  And I'm definitely excited about the possibilities in their season-opener's closing round tomorrow, as I just finished explaining.  But even I have to admit that the LET's World Ladies Championship over at Mission Hills in Hainan, China, is blowing the Daikin Orchid Ladies away this week.

Let me count the ways:

• World #2 Suzann Pettersen has been playing great golf, going 67-68-66 to move to -18 and lead the Melee at Mission Hills every day of the tournament.  Thus far, I should say.  Because world #1 Inbee Park just shot an 11-under-par 62 to join her at the top of the leaderboard.  I'd say the highlight of her round was the 6 birdies in a row that she made between holes 9 and 14, but that would be downplaying her 5 other birdies, 3 before and 2 after the train.  Pettersen needed a bogey-free 32 on the back to avoid getting blown away, as Park opened with a 32 and closed with a 30!  So a showdown between the top 2 players in the world definitely trumps a showdown between the top 2 players on the JLPGA from last season.  Throw in #5 So Yeon Ryu (70, -12) and there are brighter stars playing better on the LET than on the JLPGA this week (yes, Ji-Yai Shin, Mika Miyazato, and Sun-Ju Ahn are within striking distance of the lead in Okinawa)--even if #7 Shanshan Feng is stuck at T18 after a 69 brought her only to -6 in her home country.
• You like young guns?  The World Ladies Championship's got young guns galore.  Sure, Rikako Morita, Mamiko Higa, Ayaka Watanabe, and Kumiko Kaneda have some name recognition in Japan, but if by some chance you haven't yet heard of Ariya Jutanugarn (67, -13), In Gee Chun (68, -11), Minjee Lee (69, -11), or Ha Na Jang (69, -8), you'll know who they are after tomorrow's round.
• How about lesser-known players trying to make a name for themselves this week?  Ye Na Chung (68, -14), Joanna Klatten (66, -10), Amelia Lewis (67, -10), and Holly Clyburn (64, -7) are playing great golf this week.  Clyburn's bogey-free round would have headlined almost any other round in any season, after all.  How well do Onnarin Sattayabanphot, Airi Saitoh, and Esther Lee stack up against them?  Pretty well, but when you consider that Chung has the best chance of anyone in Mission Hills to headhunt the world #1 and #2 tomorrow, well....
• How about complete unknowns trying to play Cinderella?  Taiwan's Yi Chen Liu (67, -11) may not have much of a chance to actually win this thing, but she's certainly in the running for a top-3 finish!  15-year-old Okinawan Hina Arakaki may be closer to the lead and more likely to repeat as low amateur in the Daikin Orchid Ladies (the only other one to make the cut, 17-year-old Anri Iha, is 3 shots behind her), but I've got to give the nod to Liu for hanging with the big girls double digits under par thus far, even if only those from China would consider her to be playing in her home country this week!
• Plus, the World Ladies Championship has a team element, which Korea is going to win once more.  But the U.S., France, China, and Thailand are in a real race for 2nd.

Probably the best chance the JLPGA has to grab some headlines is if former world #1 Ji-Yai Shin were to come from 3 behind tomorrow and put her name firmly in the running for the last spot on Team Korea at the LPGA's International Crown.  But if Ha Na Jang plays well enough to pass In-Kyung Kim in the Rolex Rankings, even a Shin win would most likely play second fiddle.  And while Shin's 6th JLPGA victory and 1st since 2010 would be the main story out of Okinawa, Jang is only one subplot of many coming out of Mission Hills.  There's just no beating a Park-Pettersen shootout!

So, yeah, I'll keep waving my Japanese flag over here at Mostly Harmless, but this week the JLPGA's finest are definitely getting overshadowed--and rightly so!

Happy New Year from Mostly Harmless!

I was hoping to share for New Year's Day a few clips from the 2013 Kohaku Uta Gassen (which I tweeted about sporadically and belatedly @mlyhlssgolf), but NHK has youtube locked down, as usual.  So instead I'm linking to some images of 1/1/14 in Japan and the rest of the world.

• BBC World News
• NY Daily News

Enjoy, and have a great year!

Hanwha Classic Fireworks: Sae Young Kim Makes 2 Eagles in Final 10 Holes to Catch So Yeon Ryu, Wins Playoff

So Yeon Ryu had the Hanwha Classic in total control for most of the weekend, but unheralded Sae Young Kim eagled the par-4 9th from the fairway and got a hole in 1 on the 17th to give herself a chance, then birdied the par-5 18th to force a playoff with the world #5 and beat her on the 1st hole.  Kim was 5 shots down with 9 holes to play, still 5 down with 5 to play, and 3 down with 2 to play, but took the trophy out of Ryu's hands with brilliant scrambles as well as amazing approach shots.  Check out HappyFan's play-by-play near the bottom of the Seoul Sisters.com thread to find out exactly how Kim did it--it's got to be one of the most amazing finishes of the new century!

Constructivist Family Highs and Lows on Wegmans LPGA Championship Sunday

I saw Ai Miyazato hit 1 shot at the 2013 Wegmans LPGA Championship, a beautiful fairway wood on the 11th hole at Locust Hill, her 2nd hole of the final round and 20th of her day.  At the time, I had no idea she had just doubled the difficult downhill 10th, or would fail to birdie the par 5 but would go on to make her 8th, 9th, and 10th birdies of the day over the course of the back 9 to move from +5 to -2 and into contention yet again in Pittsford, or would falter over her final 9 with 3 bogeys and only 1 birdie to extend her streak of non-wins at LPGA majors to 34 starts.

Nope, I was with onechan at the time, following Paula Creamer, Lydia Ko, and Jennifer Rosales.  We had wandered over from the 17th fairway to the 11th against onechan's wishes because I had figured out that Ai-sama's group had just hit their drives, but she made the best of the situation by calling out "Gambatte-ne!" to Ai-sama before she started sizing up her 2nd shot.  The wave we got from my favorite golfer was one of my high points of the day, but for onechan it was just one of many cool moments, like the chances she and imoto got to ride a shuttle bus, the smiles she got from Paula Creamer (whom she had followed for 15+ holes during last year's final round) at different times while she and I followed her for most of the back 9 of the final round, the golf ball Mika Miyazato rolled to her on the 1st tee a little while later after onechan had seized the opportunity to send a "Gambatte-ne!" her way, the signatures she got from Kristy McPherson, Moira Dunn, Ya Ni Tseng, and others on her floppy pink hat towards the end of the day, the chance to see Ai-sama again at our favorite Korean restaurant in Rochester early that evening, or, her favorite moment, when Paula stopped to ask her her name, age, and favorite color.

Sure, I could have gone straight to find Ai-sama on the front 9 when we first arrived at Locust Hill and the girls were having fun at the play area and Wegmans loot tent with their mom, but by the time I realized what a great 3rd round she was having, I had already committed to following Chie Arimura (who got it to -2 with 19 holes left to play, but doubled 18, tripled 4, and sprinkled 3 other bogeys into her final round to plummet out of contention), Michelle Wie, and Shanshan Feng on the back.  I had thought the Full Metal Archivist would take both girls to follow imoto's favorite player, Ji-Yai Shin, when she and Amy Yang and Sarah Jane Smith had hit the 11th tee, so that I would get more time with the Arimura threesome, but the FMA wasn't handling the heat well and understood the flow of play worse, so had ended up tiring the girls out walking up and down the 10th and 18th hills after they had gotten bored with the free shopping and eating.  As a result, I had to backtrack back to the loot tent sooner than I expected go meet up with them and decide what to do next, which was for imoto and the FMA to camp out in the shade by the 17th green while onechan and I caught up with Paula's group.  By the time onechan and I returned to 17 from doing just that, the FMA and imoto had taken the opportunity to follow Shin's group up 18, gotten Shin's autograph and a ball from Yang, and booked down the hill again and crossed Jefferson Road to rendezvous with us.

Again, I could have had us all wait for Ai-sama's group to reach us there at 17, but Mika Miyazato, Caroline Hedwall, and Belen Mozo rolled in just as we got settled in and onechan and I decided to follow them on 18 and 1, before peeling away back up the #2 and #3 hill to get back to the FMA and imoto, who was getting stir-crazy at the 17th green (but had gotten a chance to see Ai-sama, which is more than I could say!).  Given that Mika was -2 on her final round, had just missed a short birdie putt on 17 (I just realized it would have been her 9th in her previous 21 holes!) and made a great up-and-down from about 100 yards out on 18, it seemed like the right thing to do at the time.  I could always get the ladies situated by the putting green to collect as many autographs and balls as they could while I caught back up with Mika and then followed Ai-sama for her closing holes on the front.  But even that plan didn't work out all that well, as the FMA was feeling exhausted by the time onechan and I got back to the 17th green and needed to get out of the sun, so we wasted almost an hour trying to figure out where to pick up the shuttle to take us back to the back-up media lot before realizing we were better off hitting the loot tent and just staying on the course as long as the FMA and girls could hold up.  By the time we made it back to the putting green area, and I could look for Mika's group, they were finishing up #6, so all I got to see was Mika missing 2 short birdie putts in a row on 7 and 8 and making a great par save on 9 to preserve her 72 (she had been done in by a bogey on 1, a double on 4, and those 3 missed short birdie putts I saw).  After taping the Japanese media's interviews with Mika, I was all set to finally backtrack to Ai-sama's group, when I thought I'd better drop by the putting green on the way to see how everyone was doing.

And that's when my plans went out the window.  Turns out while I was awkwardly interviewing Mika in English, onechan had incited imoto to make a dash across the empty putting green, so by the time I got there, the FMA was furious, onechan was crying, and imoto was trying to blend into the background to minimize the trouble she was in with her mom.  A volunteer graciously brought ice cream bars for the girls and we got them away from Golf Channel's interview booth, but the damage had been done.  One look at the FMA's face was enough to convince me I wasn't going back out on the course.  No way I would get a chance to see Tiffany Joh or Ayako Uehara or Mina Harigae hit a shot or 2 as I made my way back to Ai-sama's group.  No way the family could even hang out together in the 9th- or 18th-green grandstands and watch the rest of the groups come in.  Nope, it was time to back up my wife's disciplinary strategy, get everyone back to the car and into a restaurant, and get us all fueled up, cooled off, and calmed down.

So, yeah, not only did I miss Ai-sama, but I didn't even know there was a playoff going on until the end of our meal (and I didn't even find out its results until after we got home, woke the girls up for a quick bath and teeth-brushing, and got them to bed).  But what a meal it was!  It started with us getting seated right behind Se Ri Pak, waving hi to Ai-sama midway through our meal as she and her manager Takumi Zaoya walked into the restaurant, trying hard not to react as Ji-Yai Shin joined Se Ri a few minutes later and Amy Yang walked right by us, and it ended with us convincing the girls not to bother the Hall of Famer or the former world #1s, or the sure-to-break-through-soon star.  Sure, imoto made more visits than strictly necessary to look at the fish in the ornamental display at the front of the restaurant (and try to catch Ji-Yai's eye!), and onechan decided as we were leaving to bring me with her to the bathroom area at the back of the restaurant (passing by Ai-sama's table in the process), but we didn't initiate contact with any of the players.  It was actually Zaoya-san who started talking to onechan and I as we were passing by them on the way to leaving the restaurant.  Ai-sama was relaxed and friendly, but I was embarrassed and incoherent and onechan had lost her voice, so I missed a chance to have a real conversation with them, although I did accidentally find out that she wouldn't be playing the Manulife in Waterloo.

So it was all worth it, right?  Well, of course!  Not to say I won't do things differently in the future, like maybe bring the ladies on a Saturday afternoon after Japanese school and come alone on Sunday, or stay overnight Saturday so the girls could get their fixes with their favorite players on Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning and plan to split up so I could focus on covering the closing hours of the tournament.  But this year was different, and not just because of the washed-out Thursday round or the 36 holes on Sunday.  We needed to be together, for reasons I won't go into here.  And except for one big mistake and blow-up at the end of the day, the girls had a great time and the family had another memorable vacation in Rochester.  They got to see a decent proportion of the 76 women trying to be the best on the planet that day, focus on a couple of players they both really admire, and spend some quality time with their parents and each other.  Sure, the FMA suffered and I sacrificed, but it was definitely worth it.  We even got to visit an Asian market before we hit the Thruway, although not the Korean market we usually love to raid when we're in Rochester.

Maybe someday I'll break down and get a smartphone, so I won't have to rely on walking by the many electronic scoreboards or hiking back to the media center to fire up my Chromebook to find out what's going on outside my immediate vicinity.  Maybe someday onechan and imoto will be more interested in the actual golf than in being fangirls, so they'll learn something they can apply to their own games.  Maybe someday the FMA will enjoy walking the golf course more, so she can appreciate the sport more.  But given what we had and where we were and how young the girls still were, last Sunday may not have gone according to plan or supplied me with all the golfy and bloggy material I was hoping for, but it was still a great day!

Mizuno Classic Saturday: Momoko Ueda and Sakura Yokomine Blow by the Field

Momoko Ueda birdied 6 of her last 8 holes, including her last 4 in a row, to fire a bogey-free 64 on moving day and take the lead at -13 in the Mizuno Classic, but she didn't shoot the low round of the day.  That honor belonged to the golfer sitting in 2nd place 3 shots behind her, the 2009 JLPGA money-list title holder Sakura Yokomine, who birdied half the holes she played today for a bogey-free 63.  Call it a blast from the past but don't call it a comeback:  all of a sudden the two biggest names on the JLPGA besides Ai Miyazato (who's in the cellar this week and will need a good Sunday just to get back to even par) are going to be in a dogfight for their 9th (Ueda) and 19th (Yokomine) wins on tour--and 1st in what feels like forever.

That's not to say Sunday's final round will definitely come down to a 2-player shootout.  Shanshan Feng's 7-birdie 67 brought her to -9, tied with Mayu Hattori, who 1-upped her with a bogey-free 66.  Both youngsters are looking for their 3rd career JLPGA wins tomorrow.  [Correction:  Hattori has 3 already--thanks, John!]  LPGA super-soph Mina Harigae, who's playing on the JLPGA for the 1st time that I know of, matched Feng's 7-birdie 65 to make it a trio 4 behind Ueda.  How big a deal would it be for a Japanese-American golfer to win the Mizuno?  Just a little further down the leaderboard are In-Kyung Kim, Catriona Matthew, and 1st-round co-leader Teresa Lu at -8, Na Yeon Choi, Chie Arimura, Hee Kyung Seo, Akane Iijima, and Na-Ri Kim at -7, and Azahara Munoz, Ayako Uehara, Ryann O'Toole, and Asako Fujimoto at -6.  Sure, they'd need to put together final rounds as momentous as Yokomine's and Ueda's moving day feats and get some help from those ahead of them on the leaderboard to get into contention on the back 9, but stranger things have happened.

What's really surprised me is how low the scoring has been.  If you had told me Thursday that Stacy Lewis would be at -5, Ji-Yai Shin, Karrie Webb, Mika Miyazato, and Hee Young Park at -4, Sun-Ju Ahn at -3, and Mi-Jeong Jeon at -2, I would have expected them to be among the leaders on a bunched leaderboard.  Instead, Lewis is the only player in the top 20 from this illustrious group after 36 holes.  With Yukari Baba at -1, Inbee Park at E, Kumiko Kaneda at +1, Miki Saiki at +2, and Ai Miyazato at +4, I would have expected the weather and scoring conditions to be forbidding.  Instead, Momoko Ueda has a real chance to break Ji-Yai Shin's 54-hole scoring record at Kintetsu Kashikojima Country Club of -18 tomorrow.  Heck, she's already matched her own winning total from 2007!  And the only thing Yokomine did was tie the 18-hole tournament record--oh yeah, and put the lowest round ever in competition at KKCC into the record books.

So let's see what feats the leading pair of 25-year-olds can perform tomorrow.  It's an adage that it's hard to play well after going super-low, but given right now I wouldn't put anything past Momoko and Sakura!

[Update 1 (4:00 am):  The AP is in the house, beating me to the punch on 2nd-round coverage!  Reading around at Seoul Sisters.com, I saw that dual JLPGA-KLPGA member Bo-Mee Lee is in contention on the KLPGA this week.  Also, if I'm understanding correctly from other sources, Ji-Yai Shin and Ai Miyazato seem to believe that 6 events on the JLPGA this year is enough to secure their cards for 2012 (whether or not they make the top 50 on the money list??).]

[Update 2 (9:11 pm):  Nice catches by bangkokbobby!]

Not Golf

But it could be, because there's an over the water driving range just to the right of where we're looking.

Girrlz!

Here's about big long grow-ups post about the antecedents of Sparkychan, Gojochan, Jumpsan, Kongsan, Haatochan, and the Powerpuff Girls, Grrrrr!

And this is the girl who started it all. Her name is Flossie Mackenzie, she's 10 years old, and she lives in Africa, the imagined Africa of Rider Haggard's Allan Quatermain. We're in chapter 4 where Quatermain has asked her whether or not she feels lonely living "among all these savage people and without any companions of her own age":

'Lonely?' she said. 'Oh, indeed no! I am as happy as the day is long, and besides I have my own companions. Why, I should hate to be buried in a crowd of white girls all just like myself so that nobody could tell the difference! Here,' she said, giving her head a little toss, 'I am I; and every native for miles around knows the "Water-lily", -- for that is what they call me -- and is ready to do what I want, but in the books that I have read about little girls in England it is not like that. Everybody thinks them a trouble, and they have to do what their schoolmistress likes. Oh! it would break my heart to be put in a cage like that and not to be free -- free as the air.'

'Would you not like to learn?' I asked.

'So I do learn. Father teaches me Latin and French and arithmetic.'

'And are you never afraid among all these wild men?'

'Afraid? Oh no! they never interfere with me. I think they believe that I am "Ngai" (of the Divinity) because I am so white and have fair hair. And look here,' and diving her little hand into the bodice of her dress she produced a double-barrelled nickel-plated Derringer, 'I always carry that loaded, and if anybody tried to touch me I should shoot him. Once I shot a leopard that jumped upon my donkey as I was riding along. It frightened me very much, but I shot it in the ear and it fell dead, and I have its skin upon my bed. Look there!' she went on in an altered voice, touching me on the arm and pointing to some far-away object, 'I said just now that I had companions; there is one of them.'

She was pointing to Mt. Kenya.

Corning Classic Thursday: Hee Young Park and Karine Icher Go Lowest, But 51 Within 5 of Them

The Constructivist Family is heading out to Japan in a couple of hours, but thought I'd quickly note that the expected fireworks at the Corning Classic came early and often. For overviews, see LPGA.com and Hound Dog. Be sure to check out the interviews. Otherwise you wouldn't find out tidbits like Sunday is co-leader Hee Young Park's birthday. Even John Kekis, one of AP's best writers on women's golf, missed that one.

With all the interesting scorecards to feature, I'll choose 1 and update from the airport: In-Kyung Kim started on the back and birdied 5 of her 1st 8 holes before double bogeying the 18th; then she went bogey-eagle-bogey-double-birdie-par-birdie-bogey-birdie. That's 3 birdies, 3 bogeys, 1 eagle, 1 double, and 1 par, for those counting from home!