Sarah Schmelzel finds herself in solo first place after a first-round 68 boosts her up the leaderboard at the HSBC Women’s World Championship. The 2019 LPGA Tour Rookie is experiencing for the first time what it is like to lead or co-lead after a round of individual play. She previously held a first-round lead with her team member, Maude-Aimee Leblanc in the 2022 edition of the Dow Championship. She looks to maintain her lead with three players sitting just one shot behind, and five players at two-under par.
Schmelzel kicked off her tournament play in Singapore on the 10th tee, making two pars before making her sole bogey on the par-4, No. 12, which would end up being the hardest hole of the day with an average of 4.333. The American maintained her one-over par positioning throughout the rest of her front nine and amongst a clustered leaderboard of players. The gears would switch for Schmelzel as she made the turn and scored two birdies in her first two holes of her back nine. She made two more pars on holes 3 and 4 to keep at one under before picking up three birdies in her last five holes to turn in the lowest round across the field. Her two birdies on the par-5 5th and the par-5 8th as well as her birdie on the par-3 7th contributed to her back nine score of 31. Schmelzel’s five birdies tied for first in the field alongside Esther Henseleit, Stephanie Kyriacou and Aditi Ashok.
“It was good, a little shaky at the start, the front nine made some good par saves, three of them scattered over the front nine. It was about good, then just got some putts to go in on my back nine on the front,” said Schmelzel. “Everything felt good. Working on some stuff so it's nice to see some hard work pay off. Just keep it going.”
In a tie for second place is LPGA Tour winner Linn Grant, German player Henseleit, and 2023 Rolex Player of the Year Lilia Vu. Grant also made just one bogey on Thursday, accompanied with four birdies scattered across her leaderboard on holes 2, 8, 13 and 14. Vu was one of five players to turn in a bogey-free scorecard in the first round, making three birdies on three par-4s, Nos. 3, 6 and 14. Henseleit started off her round two-over par through three holes when a mindset switch led to a streak of four birdies from Nos. 5 to 8. She made one birdie on the par-5 13th hole to jump one spot up.
“It's always great to start off the year, it shows you that you did some good work over the off-season. Yeah, I've been playing well last week. Couldn't really get it going on the weekend,” said Henseleit who finished T49 at Honda LPGA Thailand. “But I do have a lot of confidence in my golf game at the moment, and my putter was also really good today.”
Five players sit in a tie for fifth place including sponsor invite and four-time LPGA Tour winner In Gee Chun, 2023 U.S. Solheim Cup team member Andrea Lee, 2021 HSBC Women’s World Championship winner Hyo Joo Kim, two-time LPGA Tour winner Leona Maguire and 2023 Rolex First-Time Winner Chanettee Wannasaen. Players return to the course tomorrow to begin the second round of play starting at 8:00 a.m. local time.
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