The Royal Melbourne Golf Club – Composite Course
Melbourne, Australia
Second Round Tournament Notes and Interviews
February 20, 2015

Watch interviews courtesy of Golf Australia

Rolex Rankings No. 1 Lydia Ko (-6)
Rolex Rankings No. 36 Charley Hull (-4)

Lydia Ko’s second straight round of 3-under 70 has propelled her into a share of the lead with Ha Na Jang and Ariya Jutanugarn at 6-under heading into the weekend - an unsavory place for her competitors to see the No. 1 player in the world after two rounds. Only once has Ko held at least a share of the lead after two rounds, which she finished with a win at the 2012 CN Canadian Women’s Open. Four of Ko’s five wins on the LPGA Tour have been with spectacular Sunday rounds to come from behind for the win.

Ko’s 3-under 70 on Friday came behind the strength of a beautiful hole out from 136 yards on the par-4 15th for eagle, her second consecutive day with an eagle on her card.

“I made on eagle on 14 yesterday and then I was angry that I came off with a par today. I felt like it was a hole that I could easily come off with a birdie. I was kind of angry and that kind of anger led me to hit an aggressive drive on the 15th.” Ko said. “I was on the left edge of the fairway and I had 136 or something like that and I said ‘eight could be a little long,’ so I decided to punch a nine iron, and it landed just left of the pin and the mouth kind of feeded it right to the hole.”

Jang is making waves as a rookie, climbing into at least a share of the lead for the second time in her first three
tournaments of 2015. Her 4-under 69 on Friday was the low round of the day and came on the strength of six birdies.

“I think it was better today. I think it’s more simple thinking, only fairway and then green and two putt,” Jang said. “So no pressure, I’m feeling better today.”

Jutanugarn opened with bogeys on two of her first six holes but rallied to play the last 10 holes in four under par to tie the lead. She had a particularly pivotal two-hole stretch in the middle of her round, making birdie on the difficult par-4 ninth and then an eagle on the par-5 10th. Only once before has Jutanugarn held a share of the lead entering the third round. That came as a 17-year-old at the 2013 Kingsmill Championship, where she finished in a tie for third.

“I’ll just enjoy it and have fun,” Jutanugarn said. “It’s why we play.”

A SIGN OF THINGS TO COME

Each of the last two days, Charley Hull and Lydia Ko have teed it up in the same pairing. It’s a pairing fans can expect to see many times in the years to come and it’s easily one of the strongest teen pairings in golf history. No. 1 in the world and No. 1 on the Ladies European Tour Order of Merit a year ago playing alongside each other, both in the top five on the leaderboard.

“I enjoy playing with Lydia. I’ve played with her quite a bit over the past two years,” Hull said. “I first played with her two years ago straight after the Solheim Cup in the
Canadian Open and we both played well, both like at the top of the leaderboard in the first two rounds, so I have good memories playing with Lydia and I enjoy it.”

The two styles differ. Hull overpowers golf courses, mashing it 280 yards down the middle and aggressively attacking pins. Ko plays a safer, shorter game, frequently having to hit hybrids into holes on her second shots, but might have the best short game on Tour.

“I find it quite interesting because I’ve never not hit a blade before,” Hull said. “I’ve always been quite old school.”

Either way, these two look like the new school on the LPGA Tour with this week acting as a glimpse into what’s become the future and present of professional women’s golf.

RESIDENT MASHERS
For years Brittany Lincicome and Lexi Thompson have been the LPGA Tour’s resident mashers, the duo most likely to win a long-drive competition with towering drives. But two rookies may be challenging their surpremacy in 2015. Charley Hull and Ariya Jutanugarn both are hitting the cover off of the ball this week with distance unseen on the Tour.

Hull, for example, hit three wood - three wood onto the green at the 530-yard par-5 17th on Thursday and is averaging 264.5 yards per drive, despite hitting three wood on almost every tee shot. She estimates her drives are around 280 but says many of the doglegs on Royal Melbourne don’t allow for her to unleash the driver. Take the 438-yard par-4 9th as an example of Hull’s power. Many of the players in the field hit driver, hybrid. Not Hull.

“I don’t hit many drivers out there. At the ninth today, I hit three wood - seven iron, which was pretty good,” Hull said. “I feel like I can carry bunkers and not hit a lot of club because driver’s going to be running out. It’s nice to position shots and come in with a shorter iron. I definitely think if you’re a bit longer, you’re coming in with shorter clubs and you can stop them on the greens.”

Jutanugarn’s hitting the ball in places few in the field can fathom either. Her driving distance on Friday - 282 yards - would have bested Lincicome’s tour-leading average a year ago by more than 10 yards.

HULL'S STAR GROWING BRIGHTER
Charley Hull’s immense talent has been impossible to ignore since she stormed on the scene at the 2013 Solheim Cup with a dominant victory over Paula Creamer as the youngest player in Solheim Cup history at 17 years old.

However, there’s still going to be mistakes that bring growing pains along the way, and Hull got that experience first hand last week at the RACV Masters when she stormed into the lead and seemed in control of the tournament but made a triple bogey at the 8th hole. She had a four-putt on the sixth hole here Thursday as well in an otherwise splendid 2-under 71 and was asked after her round Friday if she felt she was having problems putting a full round together.

“No, I just four putted that hole and it just didn’t go in and then I had a couple of three-putts as well. Probably it’s just learning from experience,” Hull said sagely. “I just feel like sometimes I can get a bit ahead of myself and do silly stuff like that, but I feel like I concentrate well after and try and get them back, like I usually make birdie a couple of holes after. So I do think that four-putt cost me quite a few shots, but at the end of the day, I’ve learned from it so hopefully it won’t happen again.”

This rookie long ago proved no stage was too big for her game with a top-10 in a major and 2-1 record in the Solheim Cup under her belt and is enjoying the big Aussie crowds out this week to watch her and Ko in the featured pairing.

“I enjoy being in front of the big crowds. It feels really good, I enjoy it,” Hull said.

Despite being in contention the last two weeks, Hull is in a transition stage and hasn’t felt as comfortable as normal with her game.

“I just changed my swing coach six weeks ago. I’m still working on my swing and that’s why some of my iron shots are a bit off, because I still haven’t got my feel about my three-quarter shots to cut or draw a few balls in,” Hull said. “Hopefully towards the weekend, I’m going to do a bit more range practice and get a bit more feel.”

MASSIVE EAGLE
It was an up-and-down day for Jessica Korda in which she birdied two of her first three holes and looked like she might challenge the lead before deflating bogeys on two of her next six holes to close the front nine. She opened the back nine with a birdie on the 10th but immediately bogeyed the next before reeling off four straight pars. But Korda saved her best for the end of the round and made a huge eagle on the par-5 17th and then made par on the difficult last to get within three of the lead heading into the weekend.

Korda, the Tour’s leader in greens in regulation, hit 15 of 18 greens on Friday and is always a threat at Royal Melbourne, where she won this event in 2012. She trailed by two shots in 2012 heading into the weekend when she won this event in a six-way playoff.

WORKING FOR THE WEEKEND
Barring a miracle, local favorite Karrie Webb won’t repeat here this weekend, but she will play the weekend. The 2014 champ shot a disappointing 5-over 78 on Friday but did make the cutline on the number despite going through a swing change.

“I warmed up really well today. I’m just not going out there and fully committing and playing the shots,” Webb said. “I mean, the course and the conditions are dictating that a little bit. It’s actually hard to get in there and fully trust what you’re doing when you do hit a good shot and it goes over the back. But I need to do that more. At this stage I’m not thinking about a result; I’m thinking about bringing on to the course what I’m doing in practice.”

Notables to miss the cut after Friday’s third round were Yani Tseng, Gerina Piller, Su Oh (the 18-year-old Aussie phenom who won the RACV Ladies Masters a week ago in only her second professisonal start), Lee-Anne Pace, Laura Davies, and Moriya Jutanugarn.

The cutline fell at 5-over-par 151 with 73 players making the cut. This is the highest cutline of the year through three events so far.

NUMBERS TO KNOW
1 - The number of times Lydia Ko has held at least a share of the lead after the second round. That came at the 2012 CN Canadian Women’s Open, where she went on to win by five shots.
2 - Amount of shots Jessica Korda trailed by after the second round when she won on this course in 2012 at this event.
12 - Charley Hull’s prediction for how many under par it’s going to take to win the golf tournament.
19 - The average age of the top four on the leaderboard - Ko (17), Hull (18), Jutanugarn (19) and Jang (22) - is 19.
69 - Ha Na Jang’s 4-under 69 on Friday was the low round of the day and climbed her into a share of the lead at 6-under.
136 - Lydia Ko hit a punch 9 iron from 136 yards into the bottom of the cup at the par-4 15th hole for an eagle.
282 - Ariya Jutanugarn’s average driving distance on Friday.
2013 - Ariya Jutanugarn first held a share of the second round lead at the 2013 Kingsmill Championship as a 17-year-old and wound up finishing in a tie for third.

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