Australia’s LPGA stars have put themselves within the hunt on a testing opening day of the US Girls’s Open at Erin Hills Golf Course in Wisconsin.
The lightning quick greens coupled with thick tough surrounding the fairways and greens made birdies exhausting to return by, and bogeys prevalent, within the first spherical of the second ladies’s main of the 12 months however Grace Kim and Hannah Inexperienced fought exhausting to sit down 4 photographs off the lead within the US$12 million (A$18.6m) main.
There’s a six-way tie on the prime between Korean duo A Lim Kim and Jin Hee Im, American pair Angel Yin and Yealimi Noh, Japan’s Rio Takeda and Spain’s Julia Lopez Ramirez, who all shot four-under par rounds of 68, on the venue which hosted Brooks Koepka’s triumph within the males’s US Open in 2017.
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World No.8 Inexperienced opened her match with a good par 72 that included a gallant battle again late in her spherical.
The 2019 Girls’s PGA champion careworn earlier than the match that endurance would be the key to success round Erin Hills’ brutal 6745-yard (6167 metres) structure, which is the longest a US Girls’s Open course has performed since 2016, and he or she reaped the rewards of doing so with back-to-back birdies on the eighth and ninth, the ultimate two holes of her spherical.
That burst adopted a double bogey seven on the par 5 seventh, as Inexperienced made 5 birdies and three bogeys for the day.
Inexperienced: Endurance key to US Open success | 00:48
She gave herself loads of scoring alternatives nonetheless, because the 28-year-old missed only one fairway.
Kim in the meantime, appeared headed for an below par spherical till a bogey on the final, the par 3 ninth, dropped her again to even par.
The 24-year-old was rock strong off the tee as she didn’t miss a single fairway, and capitalised on her stellar driving by making birdies on the par 5s 14 and 18.
A bogey at 17 ensured she reached the flip in 35 earlier than making eight straight pars throughout the entrance 9, her second 9.
Minjee Lee and Gabriela Ruffels are only a shot again from Inexperienced and Kim after signing off on respective 73s, the identical rating as world No.1 Nelly Korda, whose sole birdie for the day got here on the final gap.
Lee, the 2022 US Girls’s Open champion and a two-time main winner, began robust with a birdie on the first gap however a double bogey on the fourth and a bogey on the seventh dropped her again to two-over par.
However a birdie on the ninth ensured she e book ended a entrance 9 37 in fashion, earlier than a strong again 9 that contained only one birdie and on bogey stored her at +1.
Earlier within the afternoon subject, 25-year-old former Australian primary junior tennis participant Ruffels disappointingly bogeyed the par 5 18th to complete her spherical by dropping shot.
However Ruffels was constant all through the day, making two birdies and three bogeys, as her quick recreation bailed her out a number of occasions as she hit simply ten greens in regulation.
Stephanie Kyriacou is a shot again from Ruffels after capturing a 74.
The 24-year-old spoke to foxsports.com.au earlier within the week about her rise that has her sitting twenty sixth on the LPGA’s cash checklist this season, having pocketed US$415,567 (A$644,899) to date, however she might want to flip issues round within the second spherical after carding 4 bogeys to off set her two birdies.
Jennifer Elliott, who got here by means of qualifying to earn a spot within the 156 participant subject, had a tricky initiation in her main debut as she shot a six-over par 78.
The 24-year-old, whose household moved to Perth from South Africa when she was age seven, is a rookie skilled on the ANNIKA Womens All Professional Tour, named for ladies’s golf legend Annika Sörenstam and designed as a pathway to the secondary Epson Tour, after enjoying faculty golf in america at Sam Houston State College in Texas.