Who Are Your Picks for the Northwest Arkansas Championship?

Here are my picks for the Northwest Arkansas Championship, the last tournament on the LPGA schedule before the U.S. Women's Open at Sebonack, for this week's PakPicker at Seoul Sisters.com.

1. Miyazato Ai
2. Miyazato Mika
3. Park Inbee
4. Shin Ji-Yai
5. Yang
6. Pettersen
7. Feng
8. Choi Na Yeon
9. Arimura
10. Lewis
11. Nordqvist
12. Kerr

Alts: Munoz, Creamer, Kim In-Kyung

Who are your picks?  If you like picking horses for courses, here are the tournament results over its 6-year history.  If you like picking hot hands, check out the 2013 performance chart you can download from the LPGA's statistical records page.  If you're a moneyball-type picker, the LPGA's stats page is the place for you.

Suntory Ladies Sunday: Rikako Morita Fires 31 to Notch 3rd Win of 2013

JLPGA money-list leader Rikako Morita fired a bogey-free 31 on the back 9 of the Suntory Ladies, which included 3 birdies in her last 4 holes, to pass 3rd-round leader Kumiko Kaneda and hold off Yumiko Yoshida and 19-year-old Mamiko Higa by a single shot.  The 23-year-old Kyoto native has now won 3 times on the JLPGA this season; because she's also had 2 silvers and 4 bronzes, she's already earned more this season than in any of her previous 4 full seasons on tour.  Having brought her career victory total up to 5, Morita is clearly the player to beat in 2013 on the JLPGA.

To get the win, she didn't just outduel the JLPGA's top youngsters (such as Ritsuko Ryu, who blistered the course with a 66 to finish at -8, 2 shots behind Morita), she also outran some truly accomplished players on tour, such as Yuri Fudoh (50 career wins, almost 1.3 billion yen in career winnings), whose 70 brought her to -8, 2 shots behind Morita, Ji-Hee Lee (17 wins, over 777 million yen in winnings), whose 69 got her into a tie for 7th at -6, and Sun-Ju Ahn (11 wins in only 4 years on tour, over 387 million yen in winnings), who slipped into neutral for the weekend but still managed to earn her 3rd top 10 of the season this week.  And she left former money-list winners like Sakura Yokomine (73, -2) and Shiho Oyama (72, E) in the dust.

With Miki Saiki finishing in the middle of the pack, the money-list leader extended her lead this week.

1. Rikako Morita ￥86.91M
2. Miki Saiki ￥56.46M
3. Sakura Yokomine ￥43.53M
4. Mamiko Higa ￥41.79M
5. Hiromi Mogi ￥35.49M
6. Mi-Jeong Jeon ￥35.04M
7. Natsuka Hori ￥32.60M
8. Onnarin Sattayabanphot ￥32.56M
9. Ritsuko Ryu ￥31.85M
10. Junko Omote ￥27.81M
11. Yuki Ichinose ￥27.61M
12. Kumiko Kaneda ￥24.10M
13. Yukari Baba ￥23.61M
14. Maiko Wakabayashi ￥22.77M
15. Yumiko Yoshida ￥21.50M
16. Shiho Oyama ￥21.46M
17. Teresa Lu ￥21.07M
18. Mayu Hattori ￥20.29M
19. Miki Sakai ￥17.67M
20. Na-Ri Kim ￥17.56M
21. Megumi Kido ￥15.78M
22. Erika Kikuchi ￥15.67M
23. Rui Kitada ￥14.56M
24. Esther Lee ￥14.44M
25. Na-Ri Lee ￥14.05M
26. Soo-Yun Kang ￥13.87M
27. Sun-Ju Ahn ￥13.44M
28. Yuki Sakurai ￥13.33M
29. Phoebe Yao ￥13.12M
30. Ji-Hee Lee ￥13.05M
31. Harukyo Nomura ￥12.63M
32. Kaori Ohe ￥12.43M
33. Erina Hara ￥12.01M
34. Ji-Woo Lee ￥11.80M
35. Bo-Mee Lee ￥11.45M

Next up on the JLPGA is the Nichirei Ladies in Chiba prefecture.  Morita will get a chance to make it 2 in a row and join a list of former champions that includes Yuri Fudoh, Ai Miyazato, Sakura Yokomine, Shiho Oyama, Mi-Jeong Jeon, Ji-Hee Lee, and Yuko Mitsuka.

Father's Day Video: Cockatiel Sings Totoro Theme Song

For all the Miyazaki dads out there!



Happy Father's Day!

Suntory Ladies Set-Up: 23-Year-Old Kumiko Kaneda Looks for 2nd Career JLPGA Victory

At -8, Kumiko Kaneda leads the Suntory Ladies after 54 holes on the strength of a bogey-free 69 today that leapfrogged her 1 shot ahead of Esther Lee (72) and 2 shots ahead of 19-year-old Mamiko Higa (73) and kept her 2 shots ahead of  living legend Yuri Fudoh (68) and Yumiko Yoshida (whose 66 matched Sun-Ju Ahn's from the 1st round and Rikako Morita's from the 2nd round as 2nd-best scores of the week thus far after Misuzu Narita's opening 64).  Former and current money list leaders are only 3 shots off the pace, as Ahn (71) and Morita (72) played solidly, while Sakura Yokomine made a bid to get into contention with a bogey-free 67 that left her 5 shots behind Kaneda.

Other notables lost ground on the leader, including Ji-Hee Lee (72, -3), Ritsuko Ryu (74, -2), Narita (who shot her 2nd-straight 75 to fall back to -2 for the week), 2nd-round co-leader Akane Iijima (78, -1), Shinobu Moromizato (71, -1), Miki Saiki (69, E), Shiho Oyama (73, E), Soo-Yun Kang (71, +1), Yuko Mitsuka (72, +1), Mi-Jeong Jeon (75, +2), last week's winner Junko Omote (75, +2), Tamie Durdin (75, +3), Young Kim (73, +4), and Simin Feng (73, +4).  But at least they're playing on the weekend, unlike Harukyo Nomura, Na-Ri Kim, Erina Hara, Li-Ying Ye, and Onnarin Sattayabanphot, who all missed the cut, or Teresa Lu, who WDed during the 2nd round with abdominal pain.

Still, the winner will most likely come from the group of 8 golfers within 3 shots of the lead who are playing together tomorrow in the final 3 threesomes.  It'll be interesting to see if Fudoh can continue the JLPGA veterans' winning streak, Kaneda or Higa can strike a blow for the youngsters, Ahn or Lee can put Korea back on the map, Yoshida or Kaori Nakamura can pull off a surprise win, Morita can extend her money-list lead, or Yokomine can go super-low and steal the title from everyone else!

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!

Congratulations to Inbee Park and Junko Omote!

Huge congratulations to Inbee Park on her Wegmans LPGA Championship playoff victory over Catriona Matthew and to Junko Omote for holding off some of the JLPGA's top young guns and going wire-to-wire to take the Yonex Ladies.  It was Park's 2nd-straight LPGA major and 3rd of her career, while for Omote it was her 1st JLPGA victory since 2005.

Park made 5 birdies in her last 10 holes in the morning 3rd round to chase down Morgan Pressel, who had birdied her last 3 holes in a row on the front to get to -9 for the week, but stumbled home with a birdieless 39 to fall back to -7.  In the final round, it looked for most of the afternoon like a Park-Pressel duel, as Park birdied the 5th to get to -9, but then bogeyed 2 of her next 3 holes to fall back into a tie with Pressel, who had bogeyed the par-3 7th to fall to -6 but birdied the par-5 8th.  From there, though, both leaders struggled.  Pressel was 1st to do so, with bogeys on 10 and 12 that dropped her to -5, while Park extended her lead to 3 shots with a birdie on the par-5 11th.  Playing bogey-free golf 2 groups ahead of the leaders, Matthew seemed to be playing for 3rd, even as she birdied 2, 9, 12, and 17 to get to -5.  But then it was Park's turn to struggle, as she bogeyed 14 and 16 to fall to -6 and failed to birdie 17.  She still maintained a 2-shot lead on Pressel, who had also bogeyed the short par-4 16th, but her lead on Matthew was 1 as she went to the 18th tee.  That proved to be too small, as she bogeyed the final hole to allow Matthew into a playoff.  Both players parred 18 and 10, but when Matthew bogeyed 18 and Park made an 18-footer for birdie, the victory belonged to the #1 player in the world of women's golf.  Park becomes the 7th player in LPGA history to start off the year with 2 consecutive major titles and extends the streak of Asian winners in LPGA majors to 9.  

Other players had great chances to be the ones to extend that latter streak, but even an eagle on the par-4 13th in the final round couldn't get Amy Yang into the winner's circle for the 1st time on the LPGA, while Ji-Yai Shin, who was hanging with Park and Pressel for a good part of the 3rd round, made an uncharacteristically high number of bogeys (8 in her final 19 holes), with her last 3 on the back offsetting her 4 birdies between 11 and 16, particularly the last one on the par-5 17th that dropped her to -3.  In addition, Chella Choi was -4 with 6 holes to play but made bogeys on 13 and 16 to fall out of contention, while Na Yeon Choi and Sun Young Yoo were -4 with 9 holes left to play but the former bogeyed 10, 14 and 18 while the latter doubled 10 and bogeyed 14 to end their hopes for their 2nd LPGA majors.  Meanwhile, Matthew wasn't the only player to have a great chance to break the Asian streak in LPGA majors:  Suzann Pettersen made a slight adjustment to her putter's address position between the 3rd and 4th rounds and fired the low round of the week in the afternoon, a bogey-free 65 that features 7 birdies (despite her going 0 for 3 on the par 5s), beating Ai Miyazato's 3rd-round 66 by a single shot but falling outside the playoff by exactly that margin.

Although conditions were clearly tough in Niigata for the final round of the Yonex Ladies, Omote orchestrated her 2nd-straight bogey-free round in a row (she made only 1 bogey in 54 holes!) to hold off money-list leader Rikako Morita, who closed with a Pettersen-esque 65, by 2 shots and Ritsuko Ryu (69) by 3.  It was her 3rd win on the JLPGA in a career that stretches back to 1998 but had been a far cry in the last 7 seasons from her peak in 2003 to 2005, when she won twice, finished 2nd 10 times, and ended up in or near the top 10 on the money list.  Her win moves her up to #10 on this year's money list, on which more tomorrow.

In fact, I'll have much more tomorrow and in the coming days, including a few Constructivist family anecdotes and observations on golfers I followed today (either alone or with onechan):  Chie Arimura, Michelle Wie, and Shanshan Feng; Paula Creamer, Lydia Ko, and Jennifer Rosales; and Mika Miyazato, Caroline Hedwall, and Belen Mozo.  So even though the LPGA is taking a little break, keep on coming back here for more!

The Constructivist Family Heads to Pittsford

Well, play began at 6:30 this morning for the 3rd round of the Wegmans LPGA Championship, and the Constructivist family is getting ready to leave for Pittsford to see as much as we can of the last 36 holes of the tournament today.  The players we most want to follow will be fairly scattered over Locust Hills by the time we get there, so the plan is to let the girls play in the bounce house when we first arrive while I hand out at the 17th green getting a feel for where everyone is, then picking a spot for all of us to watch groups go by once the girls are tired of playing.  After that, it's lunch, then we split up to follow the girls' favorite players for awhile--Paula Creamer for onechan and Ji-Yai Shin for imoto.  At some point, we'll regroup and the girls will stay with the Full Metal Archivist for awhile (perhaps with a stop at the Wegmans tent!) while I bounce between the Ai Miyazato/In-Kyung Kim group, the Mina Harigae group, and the Ayako Uehara/Tiffany Joh group and eventually work my way ahead to Mika Miyazato's group.  The plan will be for all of us to rendezvous with the Paula Creamer/Lydia Ko group until they finish their final round, so the girls can get autographs and talk to them and I can get interviews with them and other players by the putting green as they come in.  Then I'll try to catch up with the Chie Arimura/Michelle Wie/Shanshan Feng group for their final holes.

I'll post updates when I find a wi-fi connection on my Chromebook!

Wegmans LPGA Championship News Flash: Eagle Time for Masson and Yoo

Sun Young Yoo and Caroline Masson have eagled par 4s on the back 9 at the Wegmans LPGA Championship this afternoon. For Masson, it was the 12th, while for Yoo it was the 10th.  Yoo's eagle ties her with Amy Yang for the low round of the afternoon wave thus far; Yang is riding a 16-hole bogey-free run and is 1 shot behind leader Morgan Pressel, who got it to -7 early in her round but is now -5 through 10.

[Update 1 (4:22 pm):  Inbee Park just birdied 18 and 1 to get to -3 for the day and tournament!]

[Update 2 (4:38 pm):  Yoo has found her groove--she's gone birdie-eagle-birdie-birdie and is -6 over her last 11 holes of bogey-free golf!]

[Update 3 (4:40 pm):  More updates on my twitter feed!]

Wegmans LPGA Championship News Flash: Michelle Wie -4 through 11 Holes

Michelle Wie struggled in her 1st round yesterday at the Wegmans LPGA Championship, opening with a 76 that featured a double bogey on the par-5 11th, her 2nd hole, and 2 bogeys in her last 4 holes.  But she's -4 through her 1st 11 holes today and so far has the low round of the day going (defending champion Shanshan Feng played the front in a bogey-free 32).  Let's see if she can keep it going in a week that counts double for Solheim Cup team qualification and counts extra in the Rolex Rankings!

[Update 1 (10:55 am):  Aussie Sarah Jane Smith is getting into the act, as well:  she's -3 through 11 holes of bogey-free golf today and actually has an 18-hole bogey-free run going!]

[Update 2 (11:16 am):  More not-quite-live blogging on my twitter feed!]

[Update 3 (12:11 pm):  Gotta give a shout-out to Lydia Ko, who bogeyed 2 of her 1st 3 holes to drop to +7 on the week, but is now -3 today through 17 and only +2 overall!]

[Update 4 (12:29 pm):  Wie's 68 low round of day so far!  Back to E for the week!]

Wegmans LPGA Championship Friday: Chella Choi Leads Ji-Yai Shin and Morgan Pressel by 1

I can't tell you how impressed I was by Morgan Pressel's 68, Brittany Lincicome's 69, and Se Ri Pak's and Jessica Korda's 70s this morning in the long-delayed 1st round of the Wegmans LPGA Championship, so you may be able to imagine how shocked I was that Chella Choi surpassed Pressel by a shot and Ji-Yai Shin tied her from the afternoon wave.  To tell you the truth, I was expecting -1 to be the best anyone would be able to manage on a soaked and nasty Locust Hill today.  Instead, Laura Davies, Angela Stanford, Che Arimura, Amy Yang, Catriona Matthew, Anna Nordqvist, Lexi Thompson, Ilhee Lee, and M.J. Hur find themselves 4 off the pace after shooting what would normally be considered fantastic 71s.  Sure, I figured something on the order of 25 golfers would finish at par or better (it was actually 23)--and today the likes of Inbee Park, Na Yeon Choi, Ya Ni Tseng, and Suzann Pettersen hit that number on the dot--but I never expected anyone to break 70.

Why am I so amazed by the 4 who did so and the 15 who got under par today?  Just consider the damage some of the world's best female golfers--or at least big names who have been playing well of late--sustained today:

80 Hee-Won Han (who just WDed), Amanda Blumenherst
79 Azahara Munoz, Sandra Gal, Gerina Piller
78 Karine Icher, Jodi Ewart Shadoff, Jenny Shin
77 Mika Miyazato, Lydia Ko, Caroline Hedwall, Mo Martin
76 Karrie Webb, Paula Creamer, So Yeon Ryu, Melissa Reid, Guilia Sergas
75 Cristie Kerr, In-Kyung Kim, Hee Young Park, Jennifer Johnson, Lizette Salas
74 Stacy Lewis, Ai Miyazato, Shanshan Feng, Hee Kyung Seo, Beatriz Recari, Moriya Jutanugarn
73 Haeji Kang, Nicole Castrale

To be sure, it could have gone either way for a lot of the players I've mentioned already.  Ya Ni Tseng recorded her 1st-ever LPGA hole in 1; Stacy Lewis doubled 2 holes and birdied 2 holes; Cristie Kerr was E through 10 but bogeyed 3 in a row, then played bogey-free the rest of the front (her back); Inbee Park doubled 18 to fall back to E, while Suzann Pettersen birdied 2 of her last 3 holes to get there; Morgan Pressel birdied 4 in a row to close out her round, while Amy Yang followed up a 10th-hole par with 4 birdies in a row to kick off her round.  And the list goes on.

In any case, that's just the golfers you might have expected to do better than that today.  If Locust Hill was that evil to them, what was it like, you might wonder, for those who hadn't been playing well?  Yes, a good number of them played well beyond expectations today (MP, BL, SRP, LD, AY, MJH, to initial a few).  But   when 20 players failed to break 80 today, you know conditions were brutal.

That just underscores that the bottom line today for today was just surviving.  It's not expected that a whole lot of rain (if any) will fall the rest of the tournament, so course conditions should improve markedly the next two (or more) days.  Assuming Locust Hill remains pretty evil tomorrow, despite that, the cut line will be +5 or (much) higher, while it's very easy for all 4 players who broke 70 today to come back to the field.  Frankly, I think anyone at E through 54 holes will have a chance to win this thing.

I wasn't able to go up to Pittsford today (took imoto with other parent-chaperones to the Niagara Aquarium) and won't be able to go tomorrow (we're helping out a friend whose husband passed away unexpectedly by taking her youngest out to the movies), but the entire Constructivist family will descend on Locust Hill on Sunday.  So for now, enjoy the major-quality notes and interviews from LPGA.com and let me know in comments what you saw on Golf Channel!

Rain Likely to Wash Away 1st Round of the Wegmans LPGA Championship

The word is out that the earliest they can possibly start play at the Wegmans LPGA Championship is 2 pm, but I'm betting the tournament organizers call the whole day off in their planned noon announcement.  The course has already received about a third of an inch of rain and there's a big line of thunderstorms massing in the southwest corner of the state on a northeasterly track to reach Pittford by late afternoon, with no obvious breaks in the rain cover over the entire western NY region in between.  Everybody with an afternoon tee time won't be playing any golf today, so why subject those in the morning wave to radically different conditions than everyone is likely to face the rest of the week?

[Update (12:15 pm):  No golf today is the word from the LPGA twitterverse!]

Who Are Your Picks for the Wegmans LPGA Championship?

Here are mine from this week's PakPicker competition at Seoul Sisters.com:

1. Miyazato Ai
2. Miyazato Mika
3. Creamer
4. Kerr
5. Webb
6. Feng
7. Lewis, Stacy
8. Park Inbee
9. Pettersen
10. Shin Ji-Yai
11. Kim In-Kyung
12. Arimura

Alts: Pak Se Ri, Ryu, Choi Na Yeon

Morgan Pressel and Jeong Jang have great records at Locust Hill, but I couldn't bring myself to put them in my top 15 this year, nor could I include more than my top 3 players without a major (plus Chie Arimura) coming into this week!

How about you?

The Best on the LPGA without a Major: 2013 Wegmans LPGA Championship Edition

All right, it's time to update my last round of predictions as to who will break through for her 1st career LPGA major, this time at the Wegmans LPGA Championship being played this Thursday through Sunday (weather permitting). As always, the numbers in parentheses following the players' names are for LPGA wins and international wins (but only from the other major tours: JLPGA, KLPGA, LET).


Most Likely to Survive Locust Hill

1. Ai Miyazato (9/17): I've said it before and I'll say it again: she's due. She's got a very good history at Locust Hill and has been on the verge of playing great golf again.  Could this be her week?

2. Mika Miyazato (1/1): She already has 9 top 15s to her credit in LPGA majors in her short professional career, including 3 top 10s in a row in 2011 (a T7 at the KNC, a T8 at the Wegmans LPGA Championship, and a 5th-place finish at the USWO) and another 3 in a row last year (T2 at the Wegmans LPGA Championship, T7 at the USWO, and 4th at the WBO). Plus, she's already won a JLPGA major, getting revenge at the '10 Japan Women's Open for her final-round collapse in the '09 edition--and she finally broke through for her 1st LPGA win last season in the midst of her major run.  Only problem is she basically shut it down early late last season, playing only 3 events after the WBO, and started off 2013 on a limited schedule, as well, with very unimpressive results for someone of her talents.  Has she been she injured? sick? burned out?  Or did she just need a break?  I didn't get to talk to her on Tuesday to find out, but I will after her morning round today.  Whatever the cause, she's contended in the last 2 events she's played and seems to always play Locust Hill well.  So I'm moving her way up this list!

3. In-Kyung Kim (3/1): Here's what I wrote on the eve of her near-miss at last year's KNC: "Talk about due: she hadn't finished worse than 12th in her last 6 majors until coming to Carnoustie, where she had her worst finish in her last 14 majors besides an exceptionally windy KNC in 2010. Even with an uneven start to 2012, I have to rank someone with 11 top 20s in that stretch of majors, one who's had plenty of shots at the winner's circle, among the most likely to get there this week."  Even after all her injuries and heartaches over the remainder of last season, she's come back strong in 2013 with another playoff loss at the Kia and 4 other top 10s, including a T5 last week on the Jersey Shore.  We know she's playing well enough to win; what we'll find out this week is what shape her psyche's in.  At #2 among the LPGA's Club 36, I would love to see her break through this week!

The Contenders

4. Beatriz Recari (2/1): Yes, she beat IK at the Kia, and she's been playing great golf for quite some time now, but her record at the majors isn't as strong (to say the least) as most of the top players on this list.  Still, it would be criminal to rank her lower than this, and you could probably make a case for putting her higher, given how accurate off the tee she is.

5. Angela Stanford (5/0): Her best chance to win a major to date was back in the 2003 U.S. Women's Open, but Hilary Lunke answered Stanford's 27-foot birdie with her own walkoff birdie to win the 18-hole playoff instead. Since then, Stanford's had 19 more top-25 finishes in majors, including 2 top 5s at the LPGA Championship (back when it was sponsored by McDonalds), a T3 and T11 in the 2 KNCs before this year's (where she fuinished T19), and a 4th-place finish at the 2011 USWO (where she was the 3rd-round leader). She's another one of those "any given week" golfers whose game is custom-made for majors--so why not this one, particularly since I believe course conditions will favor a straight shooter like Stanford?

Quantum Leap Candidates

6. Chie Arimura (0/13): She added a close call at last week's ShopRite LPGA Classic to her 2 other best finishes on the LPGA, a near-win at the 2011 HSBC Women's Champions, which always features a major-quality field, and a top 10 at the KNC that same year (her 2nd in a row there at the time).  Looks to me like her game is also rounding into shape at just the right time.

7. Hee Kyung Seo (1/11): It took her awhile last year, but she finally got over the disappointment of giving up a late-Sunday lead at the KNC and got used to being near the top of the leaderboard again in the 2nd half of the season. This season, she has 2 top 10s and 6 top 25s, so could very well kick it up a notch this week.

8. Karine Icher (0/5): She had a great 2012 and despite a slow start in 2013, she hasn't finished outside the top 30 in her last 6 starts.  She only has 1 top 10 at Locust Hill, way back in 2006, but already has 2 top 10s this season.

9. Guilia Sergas (0/0): She's playing very well in 2013 and is coming off her only top 10 at Locust Hill last year.

10. Moriya Jutanugarn (0/0): Little sister Ariya beat her to the winner's circle at the start of their professional careers, so can Moriya continue to outpace Chie Arimura in the Rookie of the Year race with a good finish at Locust Hill?  I wouldn't put it past her, but I'm less confident for her than I was at the KNC.  A win?  Might be asking for too much too soon, especially given the troubles she's had after getting herself into contention this year.  Wonder if Ariya will be on the bag for her big sister, given that she had to WD with a shoulder injury sustained during a fall in Monday's practice round....

11. Azahara Munoz (1/1): Despite missing her 1st cut in an LPGA major as an LPGA member at last year's Wegmans LPGA Championship, she played some great golf in the 2nd half of the season.  2013 has been less impressive and has included a missed cut at the KNC, but she's showed flashes of brilliance and has put in more solid starts than bad ones, so maybe she can jumpstart her season this week.

12. Jessica Korda (1/1): Yeah, she doesn't have a great record in majors and hasn't won on U.S. soil as a professional, but she's been playing really well in 2013 and is very accurate off the tee for a bomber, so who says she can't win this week?

13. Chella Choi (0/0): She's coming off a T10 at last year's WBO and a T32 at this year's KNC and already has 2 top 10s and 5 top 20s this season.  She doesn't have a super-strong record at the majors, but she has tasted what it feels like to contend on the LPGA and has made steady improvements every year she's a pro, so maybe she's ready to take it to the next level this season.

14. Haeji Kang (0/0): She's quietly becoming a non-surprise leaderboard presence and is coming off a top 10 at the Kia, a T5 in this year's KNC, and a T15 in last year's KNC.  She hasn't played well in her last 4 starts, but don't count this dark horse out!

15. Amy Yang (0/4): I still believe in what I saw from her in person in 2011 at Locust Hill:  she has a great game for majors, she's capable of going toe-to-toe with Ya Ni Tseng (or Stacy Lewis, for that matter), and she's way overdue for her 1st LPGA win.  She came really close at last year's U.S. Women's Open, falling short to Na Yeon Choi's weekend heroics (and some good bounces!), and was in the mix in last year's KNC, but the problem is that she skipped the last 2 LPGA events and finished T72 on a Mobile Bay course that should have suited her game to a T, so I suspect she's injured.  Maybe she's recovered already?

16. Lexi Thompson (1/1): Sure, she hasn't yet followed up on her top 10 at the 2010 USWO in another LPGA major, but cut her some slack, will ya? She's another one with the talent to contend any time and a surprising amount of experience in majors for someone so young, even though it hasn't all been good in terms of results.  Still, she showed off some big improvements last year, with 2 top 20s and 4 top 30s in majors, and already has several solid finishes in 2013, plus she's almost as accurate off the tee as Korda.

Watch Lists

Most wins/longest careers without a major: Hee-Won Han (6), Sophie Gustafson (5), Maria Hjorth (5)

Slumping stars in field: Michelle Wie, Morgan Pressel, Seon Hwa Lee, Momoko Ueda

Rising stars: Carlota Ciganda, Caroline Hedwall, Pornanong Phatlum, Ilhee Lee, Lizette Salas, Gerina Piller, Jennifer Johnson, Mo Martin, Danielle Kang, Jenny Shin

Possible non-LPGA winners: Lydia Ko, Melissa Reid

Quickie Locust Hill Hitchhikers Guide Update

In retrospect, spending 2/3 of my limited time on Tuesday walking the course at Locust Hill might not have been the best allocation of my efforts, given that Weather Channel is now predicting a 90% chance rain in Pittsford today, with "possibly over one inch" and "locally heavier rainfall possible," which basically means they're pretty sure some rain will fall but have no idea how bad it will be.  Assuming it won't be tournament-delaying or round-postponingly bad, my observations from Tuesday may not hold much water, so to speak.  But here they are, along with some speculation on what golfers in the morning wave might face.

First off, the 2nd cut of rough is the toughest I've ever seen it in my 5 years of attending this event.  Maybe it's because the tournament is early June rather than late June, or maybe it's because the combination of sometimes hot, sometimes wet, often sunny conditions this spring in Western NY have been perfect for growing grass, but the rough is filled with these 3-to-5-inch long seed-bearing shoots that I don't recall ever seeing before.  Not just in clumps, but fairly continuously in the roped-off areas on most holes.  True, crowds will be trampling a good deal of this stuff, but even trampled, it'll be nasty, and of course it extends well into the players' side of the ropes, as well, where it will be pure evil.  So only the strongest of the non-precision players will have a good chance to win this week.

Second, the course was soft on Tuesday, and even after two full days of drying out, it won't be able to take much water before it becomes mucky.  So if it starts raining soon, or rains hard for a few hours, Locust Hill will go from being receptive--it's a much tougher course when it's hard and fast, because it's that much harder to hit and not run through the narrow fairways on most every par 4 and par 5 and because the undulations on the greens start pinballing approach shots, pitches, and chips around--to playing very long and  presenting players with even thicker, heavier rough, tougher lies in the fairways, and varying speeds on greens as they drain at different paces.  This'll be hard on everyone, but particularly hard on players who don't carry the ball very far.

So it would seem that a straight shooter like Cristie Kerr or Shanshan Feng would have a huge advantage this week, and indeed, I believe that type of golfer has a much better chance than a bomber like Ya Ni Tseng or a precision player like Ji-Yai Shin (I'm choosing recent champions at Locust Hill, in case you haven't noticed). But of course it all depends on who adjusts best to the changing conditions over the next four (or more) days.

Besides that, I don't have too much to add to my 2010 scouting report or my 2011 focus on the back 9 or my 2012 take on Ai Miyazato's take on Locust Hill.  I did get closer looks at the 5th green, which is much more complex than a mere "3-tiered green," as I described it then, and the 6th green, which does not just feature a "big mound in the back" of the green, but one that will shoot your shot to the right or left depending on which slope you find.  And I noticed that #1 and #10 look very different from the greens looking uphill than the tees looking downhill.  #1 is much more of a dogleg than I imagined, while #10 has a lot more rough jutting into the fairway around its fairway bunkers than I previously noticed.  But otherwise Locust Hill is just the same as it's always been:  a tree-lined, narrow-fairwayed, mostly-small-greened course that ought to give most of the field fits and select out a winner worthy of the major champion title she's earned!

Locust Hill Tuesday: Random Notes on Day 2 of Wegmans LPGA Championship Week

It's still a thrill to go to an LPGA event in person, and when the tournament is a major, it's even better.  Today I drove alone to Pittsford to see who I could find at Locust Hill on a Wegmans LPGA Championship practice day--so no Constructivist family or onechan or imoto stories this time--and I only had 3 hours on the course, most of which I spent walking it, so more on that after the girls go to bed.

Because I was backtracking each side (for the most part), I didn't get to see more than a shot or two from any single player, but I sure got to see a lot of them.  Watched Ya Ni Tseng on the driving range for a bit, then headed towards the clubhouse.  Said hi to Jessica Korda as I left the tunnel connecting the driving range to the hill going up the 10th fairway, congratulated Karrie Webb on Sunday's win as we crossed by the 10th tee going in opposite directions, nodded to Lizette Salas as she left the 8th tee, saw Laura Davies on the 7th green and Lexi Thompson on the 6th, enjoyed the great view from the 6th tee, got my first really close look at the 5th green, watched Stacy Lewis stalk the 4th, enjoyed seeing So Yeon Ryu crack Inbee Park up on the 1st green (maybe the 1st time I've ever seen Inbee laugh on a golf course!), watched Tiffany Joh and Jane Park chip and putt around the 3rd, got out of Michelle Wie's way as she went to the 18th tee and I crossed Jefferson Road over toward the 17th green, watched Suzanne Pettersen and Meaghan Francella hit their approach shots on 16 and Karine Icher leave the 14th green and hit multiple shots off the 15th tee, followed Tseng and Irene Cho up the 13th and watched them drive on 14, walked back down the hill to catch Se Ri Pak and Beatriz Recari playing 15, made my way back to the other side of Jefferson Road without much sticking in my memory except another sight of Laura Davies (who seemed to be taking her practice round quite seriously!), the mind-blowing pants of Kayla Mortellaro and her caddie (taking a page from the Pornanong Phatlum handbook by way of John Daly), and Wendy Ward and Juli Inkster catching up off the 10th fairway.  While waiting to chat with Mike Scanlan, I got a chance to listen in on a light-hearted conversation between Morgan Pressel, Meg Mallon, Dottie Pepper, and a few others by the putting green, but by then I had to head back home to Hamburg for onechan's skating lesson, so I could only take 10 minutes at the driving range watching Lewis practice and Chie Arimura, Vicky Hurst, and Haeji Kang warm up before a quick catch-up with my Mohawk Valley junior golf buddy Moira Dunn and a quick ride to the end of the driving range to my Versa (happily undented).

I didn't run into either of the Miyazatos today, so I'll have to follow them on Thursday to have a chance to interview them.  Tomorrow's supposed to be such a nice day, I've got to get out and play myself and Friday I'm one of the chaperones for imoto's class trip to the aquarium, so I won't be spending as much time in Pittsford as in previous years.  But I'll be there on the weekend as much as possible, not least because onechan wants to follow Paula Creamer on Sunday just like last year!

Tony Jesselli's preview is up, and well worth checking out, as he has some photos from the ShopRite.  Ryan Ballengee is one of many passing along the news that Ariya Jutanugarn fell while jogging down a tee box in Monday's practice round and will WD because of the shoulder injury she sustained.  For more from LPGA.com, check out today's notes and interviews page and their preview posts.  I'll be back with an updated Locust Hill scouting report later tonight!

ShopRite LPGA Classic Sunday: Karrie Webb Chases Down Shanshan Feng for Career LPGA Victory #39

Hall of Famer Karrie Webb closed out her 39th career LPGA victory today at the ShopRite LPGA Classic by getting out to a hot start (par-birdie-eagle) to put some pressure on 2nd-round leader Shanshan Feng, who started out with 2 doubles in her 1st 5 holes, then grinding out par after par on the firm and fast Seaview course as the rest of the leaders saw their hopes blown away in the high winds of the Jersey Shore.  Haeji Kang made 3 doubles in a row on the front on her way to an 82, Moriya Jutanugarn ballooned to a 78, Karine Icher to a 77 (including a 40 on the back), Anna Nordqvist to a 76, and Amanda Blumenherst to her 2nd-straight 75, leaving the stage clear for only a few golfers.

For awhile, Chie Arimura looked like she might turn her rookie year on the LPGA around with a bang, as she held steady at -3 with Webb and Feng for most of the front, but a double on the par-5 9th followed by 2 bogeys in her 1st 4 holes on the back dropped her back into a tie for 5th with Gerina Piller (69), Jeong Jang (70), and In-Kyung Kim (72).  Fellow Japanese star Mika Miyazato, who's also had a slow start to 2013, watched the leaders come back to her as she hung tough at -1 throughout the front, but she closed with a 5-bogey 38 to fall out of the top 10.  Hee Young Park was also in the mix for a long time, but every time she got to -2, she fell back with a bogey soon later.  The 4th time this happened, on the 17th hole, it was too late for her to recover, but she did finish alone in 3rd at -1, 1 shot ahead of Jenny Shin, who birdied 4 holes in a row early on the back after bogeying 4 of her 1st 10 holes to take solo 4th.

In the end, then, it came down to Webb and Feng.  While Webb stayed at -3 from the 6th through 17th holes, Feng continued to ride the roller coaster, with a birdie on the 8th to fight back to -4, then bogeys on 11 and 13 to drop to -2, then a tough birdie on the par-4 16th to get to -3.  But when Webb birdied 18 and Feng bogeyed 17, Feng needed an eagle on 18 to force a playoff, but could manage only a par 5.

And just like that, Webb had her 1st LPGA win since going back to back in 2011 at the HSBC Women's Champions and the RR Donnelley LPGA Founders Cup.  She was the only player in the field to break 70 both weekend rounds and her Sunday 68 tied Paula Creamer and Cristie Kerr for low round of the day.  In a year in which her performance stats were already looking quite impressive, she kept the ball in the fairway on the weekend, got up and down when she missed Seaview's small greens, and basically reminded the world why she's a Hall of Famer.  I wouldn't be surprised if win #40 weren't too far away!

A few other performances are worthy of note:  Jeong Jang's top 5, her 1st since (get this!) 2008; Michelle Wie's top 10, her 1st since last August; and Ayako Uehara's top 10, her 1st as an LPGA member.  With Jutanugarn dropping to T18 and Arimura and Uehara finishing well ahead of her, the Rookie of the Year race is starting to get interesting, while Wie kept her Solheim Cup hopes alive this week (as did Gerina Piller with her top 5).  In fact, Wie was -4  past the halfway point of the tournament, but a combination of innaccuracy off the tee and inconsistent putting brought her down over her last 29 holes.  Let's see if these players can build on this week's results.

It was a terrible week for the #1 and #2 golfers in the world, but I expect Inbee Park and Stacy Lewis to bounce right back in Pittsford next week at the Wegmans LPGA Championship.  I plan to head up there for Tuesday's practice round to scout Locust Hill and see who I can get interviews with.  I'll be rooting for 1st alternate Mitsuki Katahira to get into the field!  But with Ariya Jutanugarn, Lydia Ko, and Melissa Reid joining the LPGA's best golfers, there's no lack of interesting stories to pursue.

ShopRite Classic News Flash: Another Double for Feng!

We now have a 3-way tie for the lead at the ShopRite LPGA Classic after Shanshan Feng suffered her 2nd double in her last 3 holes, Karrie Webb bogeyed the par-4 6th, and Chie Arimura extended her bogey-free run to 7 holes and counting.  Now the trio at -3 has to worry about Hee Young Park at -2, Mika Miyazato, Anna Nordqvist, Karine Icher, and Moriya Jutanugarn at -1, and even In-Kyung Kim and Haeji Kang at E.  True, Moriya hasn't hit a green in her 1st 5 holes and Haeji, in the final group with her and Shanshan, also doubled the 5th.  But at this point they're all in this thing!

[Update 1 (2:34 pm):  Correction, Moriya hit the 5th and birdied it to get back to -2!]

[Update 2 (2:39 pm):  Wow, the way the big numbers are piling up at the top of the leaderboard, Paula Creamer and Cristie Kerr, who fired matching 68s earlier today to climb to +3, shouldn't leave the Jersey Shore just yet!  There are now only 6 players under par in the entire field!]

ShopRite LPGA Classic News Flash: Feng Stumbles, Webb Charges, Arimura Lurks

If Shanshan Feng doesn't win the ShopRite LPGA Classic today, she'll have the par-4 2nd to blame.  For the 2nd time this week, she doubled the hole, but she bounced right back with a birdie on the par-5 3rd.  Meanwhile, Karrie Webb made up 4 shots over those 2 holes, going birdie-eagle to leap to -4.  A birdie on the 3rd by Chie Arimura got her to -3; it was her 6th birdie in her last 24 holes.

Recommended Reading: Carlota Ciganda Beats Charley Hull in Dart-Throwing Contest in Germany

Just kidding!  It was really a 7-iron on a 149-yard par 3 that decided the playoff between Carlota Ciganda and Charley Hull at the UniCredit Ladies German Open, after torrential rains washed out the last 2 rounds of the tournament.  Congrats to Carlota on her 3rd LET win and Charley on her 5th runner-up finish on tour in a row.  The two are neck-and-neck at the top of the LET's ISPS Handa Order of Merit, extending their lead on Ariya Jutanugarn.  Hull and Jutanugarn are going to have a great battle for Rookie of the Year, as well.  Lots of excitement in a Solheim Cup year in particular!

Recommended Reading: IceCat on the Prowl at Seaview

If you're not a regular at Seoul Sisters.com, you should be.  IceCat is one of the most knowledgeable commentators on the LPGA out there and he just happens to have followed the Ya Ni Tseng-Hee Young Park-Anna Nordqvist group at the ShopRite LPGA Classic yesterday.  Check out his report on the action!

Resort Trust Ladies Sunday: 19-Year-Old Mamiko Higa Wins for the 2nd Time in 2013

19-year-old Mamiko Higa won the Resort Trust Ladies today by a shot over Mayu Hattori and 2 shots over money-list leader Rikako Morita, but she had to dig deep on the back 9 to get her 2nd career victory on the JLPGA.  Just like her 1st win at this year's Yamaha Ladies, Higa played well when it mattered the most.  She started the day at -7 and stayed there for most of the front 9 while a host of big names were making serious runs at her.  Yuko Mitsuka birdied 4 of her 1st 5 holes and 5 of her 1st 8 to get to -6, while Yukari Baba birdied 5 of her 1st 6 holes to join her.  Meanwhile, Hattori and Morita each birdied 3 of their 1st 5 holes to climb to -7.  And playing partner Phoebe Yao, a 20-year-old from Taiwan, birdied the 6th hole to catch Higa at -7, as well.

But then the tide started turning and all the leaders started struggling.  Mitsuka bogeyed the 9th, Baba bogeyed the 7th and 8th.  Morita bogeyed the 7th and 9th.  Yao bogeyed the last 3 holes on the front in a row, just as Megumi Kido, another youngster playing in the final group, had bogeyed 3 of 4 holes mid-way through the front.  Higa herself bogeyed the 9th.  All of a sudden Hattori, who bogeyed the 6th but birdied the 7th had the lead at -7.

Then Sakura Yokomine jumped into the fray, following up her 2 birdies on the front with a couple more on 10 and 11 to get to -6.  Even Junko Omoto (birdie on 9 to get to -5) and Maiko Wakabayashi (birdie on 10 to get to -5) got themselves in the mix.

But not for long.  Higa responded to her mistake on 9 with a birdie on 10, the 2nd time that day she bounced back from a bogey on a par 4 with a birdie on the following par 5.  She followed it up with a birdie on the short par-4 12th--the only player who finished in the top 10 to accomplish that feat.  But the 25-year-old Hattori, who was looking for her 5th career JLPGA win, wasn't backing down from 3 groups ahead of Higa's.  She birdied the 375-yard par-4 15th to join Higa at -8.  What had started out as a free-for-all was now a long-distance shootout between a pair of rising stars.

Neither would blink, either.  Hattori parred the long par-4 16th, as Higa parred the medium-length par-5 13th.  Hattori parred the 160-yard par-3 17th, as Higa parred the 173-yard par-3 14th.  But as Hattori was parring the medium-length par-4 18th, Higa got a birdie of her own on 15 to take a slim 1-shot lead into the home stretch.  And she parred out to secure the win.

With Morita rallying on the back to take solo 3rd at -6, 8 players tying for 4th at -5, and #2 Miki Saiki falling back in the pack with a closing 74, the money-list leader extended her lead this week.

1. Rikako Morita ￥63.63M
2. Miki Saiki ￥54.15M
3. Sakura Yokomine ￥42.48M
4. Hiromi Mogi ￥34.83M
5. Mamiko Higa ￥34.11M
6. Mi-Jeong Jeon ￥33.58M
7. Onnarin Sattayabanphot ￥32.14M
8. Natsuka Hori ￥30.80M
9. Yuki Ichinose ￥25.26M
10. Ritsuko Ryu ￥23.15M
11. Maiko Wakabayashi ￥21.96M
12. Yukari Baba ￥21.81M
13. Teresa Lu ￥20.02M
14. Na-Ri Kim ￥17.56M
15. Shiho Oyama ￥17.16M
16. Kumiko Kaneda ￥16.84M
17. Mayu Hattori ￥16.79M
18. Junko Omote ￥16.41M
19. Miki Sakai ￥16.13M
20. Erika Kikuchi ￥14.88M
21. Yumiko Yoshida ￥14.23M
22. Rui Kitada ￥14.02M
23. Megumi Kido ￥13.86M
24. Soo-Yun Kang ￥13.27M
25. Na-Ri Lee ￥13.25M
26. Harukyo Nomura ￥12.63M
27. Yuki Sakurai ￥12.53M
28. Phoebe Yao ￥12.52M
29. Erina Hara ￥12.01M
30. Bo-Mee Lee ￥11.45M
31. Sun-Ju Ahn ￥11.44M
32. Ji-Woo Lee ￥11.18M
33. Esther Lee ￥11.15M
34. Da-Ye Na ￥10.72M
35. Kaori Ohe ￥10.72M

So Higa's win knocks Mi-Jeong Jeon (who started this week well but had to WD) out of the top 5, making it an all-Japanese top 5 on the JLPGA money list for the 1st time in my memory.  Instead of camping out in the top 20 of the money list as in previous years, the top Koreans on tour for the most part find themselves on the outside, looking in.  Let's see if this year's trend of a generational struggle replacing Korean dominance continues in the Yonex Ladies next week.  Higa's rise has come too quickly for her to be featured on the field list, but rest assured she is in the field.  Jeon has won here in 2009 and 2010, while Hiromi Mogi did so in 2011.  Last year's winner Shanshan Feng will be defending a different title, the Wegmans LPGA Championship, in my neck of the woods.  I plan to head out to Pittsford on Tuesday and Thursday and next weekend to cover the LPGA's 2nd major in person, but will try to give the Yonex Ladies a little bit of my attention, as well!

ShopRite LPGA Classic Saturday: Shanshan Feng Opens Up 3-Shot Lead

Shanshan Feng must like Seaview's back 9, as she followed up yesterday's 32 there with a 31 today at the ShopRite LPGA Classic to help her become the only player to break 70 twice this week and get to -6 through 36 holes.  Looks like her putter is heating up at the right time of the year, as next week is her title defense at the Wegmans LPGA Championship.

But there are plenty of golfers looking to deny Feng her 2nd career LPGA victory tomorrow.  Matching her 67 today were Japan's Chie Arimura (who stayed 4 shots behind Feng while pulling within 1 shot of Rookie of the Year race leader Moriya Jutanugarn) and Karine Icher (who also matched Feng's back-9 31 to help her get to -1 for the week).  Even closer are Jutanugarn (73), who hung in there in tough afternoon conditions to only fall back to -3, and Haeji Kang (69), who quietly slipped up the leaderboard in the morning and kept moving up in the afternoon to join Jutanugarn at T2, 1 shot ahead of Arimura and Anna Nordqvist (68).  With Karrie Webb (69), Hee Young Park (72), Michelle Wie (73), and Amanda Blumenherst (75) joining Icher at -1, there are 10 golfers within 5 shots of the lead.

But for every golfer who played her way into contention on moving day, it seemed like there were 2 who moved backwards in a big way.  Recent world #1 Stacy Lewis followed up yesterday's 67 with an 80 today, while Ji-Young Oh and Sara-Maude Juneau both went 69-79--and they all made the cut, which ballooned to +6.  That saved the likes of Cristie Kerr, Paula Creamer, Juli Inkster, Pat Hurst, and Lizette Salas, just to name a few, but not Sandra Gal (78-71), Guilia Sergas (76-73), Catriona Matthew (75-74), Natalie Gulbis (73-76), Momoko Ueda (73-76), or Lorie Kane (72-77), not to mention the many golfers who did much worse, such as recent winners Ilhee Lee, Jennifer Johnson, and Suzann Pettersen and big American names like Morgan Pressel, Lexi Thompson, Angela Stanford, and Brittany Lang.

Given that so many 1st-round leaders fell back, the golfers who went low today made huge strides on the field.  Marcy Hart's 69 moved her from T123 to T49, Ayako Uehara's 69 moved her from T76 to T19, Icher moved from T61 to T6, Arimura from T45 to T4, Jennie Lee from T45 to T11...heck, even Ya Ni Tseng--who finished bogey-par-double bogey but still shot 69, thanks to a run from the 18th hole to the 6th where she made an eagle and 5 birdies (along with a bogey)--moved from T61 to T15.  In fighting back from +5 through her 1st 20 holes to +1 at the end of today's round, So Yeon Ryu made a move on the exact scale as Tseng's.  Even more modest moves, like Mika Miyazato's and In-Kyung Kim's 70s that got them to E, moved them 16 slots up the leaderboard, while the same 70 from Jane Park meant she moved from T113 to T49.

What this means is that anything can happen tomorrow.  If Feng can break 70 for the 3rd time in a row, the tournament will be hers, but if she falls back, there are 24 golfers within 5 shots of Kang and Jutanugarn at -3...even my fave Ai Miyazato is not yet out of this thing in that case!

Resort Trust Ladies Set-Up: The Kids Are Alright

KLPGA superstar Bo-Mee Lee shared the 1st-round lead with Maiko Wakabayashi at the Resort Trust Ladies on the strength of a 7-birdie 66, but after birdieing her 1st hole today she fell apart with 2 doubles and 2 bogeys over her final 13 holes, dropping all the way to -1 and opening the door for a pair of young Japanese rising stars.  Walking right through it were 19-year-old Okinawa native Mamiko Higa and 23-year-old Megumi Kido, who fired a bogey-free 67 and 68, respectively, to take the lead at -7.

20-year-old Taiwan native Phoebe Yao got into the act, as well, bouncing back from back-to-back bogeys to start her round with 6 birdies over her last 14 holes to move to -6 for the week.  Wakabayashi, meanwhile, bogeyed 15, 16, and 17 to fall back to -5, where she was caught by 2 veterans, recent money-list leader Miki Saiki and Yayoi Arasaki.  Current money-list leader Rikako Morita bounced back from a bad opening round with a 7-birdie 66 of her own that brought her to -4 with fellow youngsters Mayu Hattori and Yuki Ichinose, along with mid-career types like Yumiko Yoshida, Megumi Shimokawa, and Mihoko Iseri, as well as veteran Junko Omote.

With Mi-Jeong Jeon withdrawing, Harukyo Nomura and Tamie Durdin missing the cut, Ji-Hee Lee barely making it at +2, Shinobu Moromizato doing hardly any better at +1, and Yuko Mitsuka, Ritsuko Ryu, and Yukari Baba tied with Lee at -1, the only name players with a chance to charge into contention tomorrow are Sakura Yokomine, Hyun-Ju Shin, Akane Iijima, and Erina Hara at -2 and youngsters Erika Kikuchi, Miki Sakai, and Satsuki Oshiro (whose best career finish on the JLPGA came here in 2011) at -3.

Higa and Kido each have 1 JLPGA victory to her name, but haven't been consistently near the top of the leaderboard this season, so it'll be interesting to see how they handle being paired with Yao tomorrow--and how all 3 young guns deal with having Morita chasing them from 2 groups ahead and Saiki from the group right before them!

ShopRite LPGA Classic Friday: Jutanugarn and Blumenherst Lead, Lewis and Wie Trail

Moriya Jutanugarn and Amanda Blumenherst lead the ShopRite LPGA Classic on the strength of 5-under-par 66s, while defending champion Stacy Lewis is hot on their trail after opening with a 67 and Michelle Wie is in the hunt thanks to her low round of the season, a 5-birdie 68.  As you can see from just this selection of names, there were some real surprises on the 1st day of this 54-hole event.

On the upside, Ji Young Oh, Jennifer Song, and Sara-Maude Juneau also broke 70, while Mi Hyang Lee and Nicole Jeray got under par with opening 70s and Christina Kim and Heather Bowie Young shot even-par 71s.

On the downside, Sandra Gal shot a 78, Morgan Pressel and Jane Park 77s, Suzanne Pettersen, Angela Stanford, Ilhee Lee, and Danielle Kang 76s, Hee Kyung Seo, Catriona Matthew, and Ayako Uehara 75s, Inbee Park, Na Yeon Choi, So Yeon Ryu, Yani Tseng, Paula Creamer, and Karine Icher 74s, and Cristie Kerr, Azahara Munoz, Chie Arimura, Momoko Ueda, and Caroline Hedwall 73s.

Of course, a good number of golfers played to expectations, with Shanshan Feng, Beatriz Recari, Hee Young Park, and Pornanong Phatlum shooting 69s, Ai Miyazato, Haeji Kang, Chella Choi, Gerina Piller, Mo Martin, and Jenny Shin shooting 70s, and players like Ji-Yai Shin (71), Karrie Webb (72), Anna Nordqvist (72), In-Kyung Kim (72), and Mika Miyazato (72) hanging at or near par.

Given how quickly a round can change at Seaview--Chella Choi opened with a bogey-free 29 on the back but closed with a birdie-less 41 on the front, to take just one example--a lot of golfers are still in this thing, provided they can get and stay hot on moving day.  With only 26s golfers at par or better after the 1st round, you can pass a lot of people with a low Saturday score.  Let's see if anyone can do it!

ShopRite LPGA Classic News Flash: Michelle Wie Ties Her Lowest Round of the Year

Michelle Wie opened the ShopRite LPGA Classic with a 3-under-par 68 this morning.  It was her best round of the year, tied only by her final round at the LPGA Lotte Championship in Hawaii; in fact, it was only her 4th sub-70 round of the year and 2nd out of her home state.  She's currently tied for leader in the clubhouse with Stacy Lewis, 1 shot behind Moriya Jutanugarn and Amanda Blumenherst, who both have a few holes left to play.  Wie's driving accuracy has been even worse than usual this season, but she hit 12 of 14 fairways and hit 14 greens in regulation today on a course that tends to favor the LPGA's precision players rather than their bombers.  I'm hoping this trend continues, as Wie hasn't been doing much in the last month to make one of my boldest predictions look very good!

[Update 1 (1:10 pm):  Oops, turns out Stacy Lewis had a 67 and Moriya Jutanugarn ended up with a 66, but I wouldn't pooh-pooh Wie's accomplishment, as Ai Miyazato had to fight back for a 70 after bogeying 4 of her last 5 holes on the back (her front), Ji-Yai Shin had a 71, In-Kyung Kim a 72, Cristie Kerr a 73, Inbee Park and Paula Creamer 74s (the latter thanks to a walkoff triple), Catriona Matthew a 75, Suzann Pettersen and Angela Stanford 76s, and Sandra Gal a 78.  Azahara Munoz and Na Yeon Choi are also well over par as they conclude their rounds.  It was not an easy morning for scoring!]

[Update 2 (6/1/13, 10:02 am):  Glad to see Ruthless Mike has a similar take on Wie's round!]

The Road to Sebonack: May 29th and 30th Results for 2013 U.S. Women's Open Sectional Qualifying

Here's a link to the USGA's overview of the sectional qualifiers for the 2013 U.S. Women's Open at Sebonack Golf Club in Southampton, NY.  Turns out I was slower than the official USGA results page this time--thank my vegetable garden for that!  You can see all the qualifiers on my overview post from May 8th.

May 29

Bear Lakes Country Club (Links Course), West Palm Beach, Fla. [pairings]

Nelly Korda(a) - BRADENTON, FLA.	141
Shannon Aubert(a) - FRANCE	143
Emily Tubert(a) - BURBANK, CALIF.	143
Jackie Barenborg Stoelting - VERO BEACH, FLA.	146
A - Lindy Duncan(a) - PLANTATION, FLA.	148
A - Sandra Angulo - PORT ST. LUCIE, FLA.	149

The Broadmoor (West Course), Colorado Springs, Colo. [pairings]

Sally Watson - SCOTLAND	148
Nicole Zhang(a) - CANADA	149
A - Katie Kempter - ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.	149
A - Kim Kaufman(a) - CLARK, S.D.	150

May 30

Algonquin Golf Club, St. Louis, Mo.

Izzy Beisiegel - CANADA	144
Megan Grehan - MAMARONECK, N.Y.	144
A - Amy Meier - ROCHESTER HILLS, MICH.	144
A - Emma Jandel - DAYTON, OHIO	144

Bent Tree Country Club, Dallas, Texas

Jamie Hullett - MESQUITE, TEXAS	145
Catherine Matranga - FORT WORTH, TEXAS	147
Kyung Kim(a) - CHANDLER, ARIZ.	148
A - Casey Danielson(a) - OSCEOLA, WIS.	148
A - Bertine Strauss(a) - SOUTH AFRICA	149

Carolina Trace Country Club (Lake Course), Sanford, N.C.

Patcharajutar Kongkraphan - THAILAND	142
Tiffany Tavee - TEMPE, ARIZ.	146
Christine Song - MARYVILLE, TENN.	147
A - Lauren Stephenson(a) - LEXINGTON, S.C.	147
A - Nannette Hill - PELHAM MANOR, N.Y.	147

Edgewood Country Club, River Vale, N.J. 

Brooke Mackenzie Henderson(a) - CANADA	136
Annie Park(a) - LEVITTOWN, N.Y.	136
Kendra Little - EUGENE, ORE.	138
A - Christel Boeljon - NETHERLANDS	139
A - Brittany Altomare - SHREWSBURY, MASS.	141