LPGA Tour Championship - 1st Round

Amy Yang and Seon Hwa Lee are your leaders after the first day of action at the LPGA Tour Championship.  Julieta Granada is two shots back in third place at -3 while four others are tied for fourth at -2.

Play was suspended on account of darkness at 5:30pm with a whopping nine groups still on the course.  One group - Irene Cho, Sandra Gal and Maria Hernandez - teed off at 12:10, meaning they weren't able to complete 18 holes in five hours and twenty minutes.  The greens were slick and tricky but that's just crazy.  Play will resume at 7am Friday with these groups finishing Round One and the regularly scheduled groups beginning Round Two.

The Orlando area woke up to 40-degree temperatures today and the early scores would have made you think it was snowing.  Nope, just wind on top of the cold made life miserable for the early-risers.  Nobody in the morning wave could break 70 - Tania Elosegui and Leta Lindley came the closest - and most couldn't avoid black numbers.  The afternoon wave had it easier as temps reached the low 60s.  Yang got off well when she eagled her second hole of the day, the par-5 11^th.  She was -4 through 11, bogeyed 3 but birdied 5 and 9 to close out with 67.  Lee posted her first round in the 60s since Arkansas (spanning 17 rounds) as she also bogeyed just once.  Granada took three bogeys but compensated nicely with six birdies to give us just three players breaking 70.  The other scores with partial rounds noted:

The notables are numerous because I wanted to list all of the bubble players in the races for the Top 80, 100 and 125.  Taylor Leon, Granada, Elosegui, Lindley and Becky Morgan are off to great starts in their efforts to reach those important goals.  Jessica Shepley made the field when somebody realized Soo-Yun Kang wasn't going to show up (she's been playing in the JLPGA Q-School all week).  Apparently Jessica got enough advance notice to make her 7:40am tee time and she made the most of it, shooting 74 to currently stand T27.

Na Yeon Choi was -4 through 12 holes and then went to pieces, playing 13 through 15 in +5.  Cristie Kerr made up two strokes on Choi in the race for the Vare Trophy and now trails by approximately four.  Ai Miyazato dealt a virtual death-blow to her Player of the Year chances - an astounding nine bogeys led to an 80 - while Jiyai Shin all-but did the same by playing her last seven holes in +6 to shoot 77.  Yani Tseng opened with a 75 - not great but unlike her four POY competitors, she doesn't have to win this tournament (or in Miyazato's case, finish second) to wind up with enough points.