LPGA State Farm Classic Tournament Preview
June 7, 2011 by
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 Cristie Kerr looks to defend the first of two consecutive titles this week when the 36th annual, $ 1.7 million LPGA State Farm Classic tees off at Panther Creek Country Club. Riding the momentum of two-straight runner-up finishes, Kerr returns to Springfield, Ill. seeking her 15th LPGA victory and a successful defense of the title she won in a Monday finish in 2010. Currently No. 4 on the Rolex Rankings, Kerr hopes to come out on top of the LPGA State Farm Classic before taking a week off in advance of the Wegmans LPGA Championship in Rochester, where she won by a record 12 strokes last year.
Brittany Lincicome arrives in Springfield with four LPGA victories under her belt including last week's ShopRite LPGA Classic where she beat Kerr and Shin by one shot. She will be joined by every other 2011 Tour winner, as well as last year's second-place finishers Rolex Rankings No. 5 Na Yeon Choi and two-time winner Anna Nordqvist. |
Kerr is amongst eight of the top-10 on the current Rolex Rankings in Central Illinois this week including No. 1 Yani Tseng, the current leader of the LPGA Official Money List and Rolex Player of the Year race, No. 2 Suzann Pettersen, who returns from an illness that kept her sidelined at last week's ShopRite LPGA Classic, and No. 3 Jiyai Shin, who missed last year's LPGA State Farm Classic after emergency appendectomy surgery in Springfield last season. Rolex Rankings No. 6 I.K. Kim, the 2009 LPGA State Farm Classic champion, will also be in town seeking her fourth-career LPGA victory. Kim was given an honorary membership to Panther Creek before last year's tournament.ShopRite LPGA Classic Tournament Preview
May 31, 2011 by
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Tseng’s biggest challenger comes in the form of Sybase Match Play Championship winner Suzann Pettersen, currently No. 2 in the Rolex Rankings. Pettersen sits 1.33 average points behind Tseng in the race to be the world’s best and hopes to build off the momentum she created by defeating Cristie Kerr in the final round of Sybase, played two hours north on the Garden State Parkway. Both Kerr and Pettersen teed it up last week at the unofficial money HSBC Brasil Cup, won by Mariajo Uribe. The Columbian will be in the field this week looking to earn her first official LPGA victory. This week’s field includes past ShopRite LPGA Classic champions Seon Hwa Lee (2006), Kerr (2004), Angela Stanford (2003), Se Ri Pak (1999), and Juli Inkster (1986, 1988), as well as all 2011 LPGA Tour winners. |
The LPGA Tour begins a significant stretch of summer tournaments this week at the HSBC Brasil Cup Tournament Preview
May 25, 2011 by
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The LPGA returns to Itanhanga Golf Club in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil for the third annual HSBC Brasil Cup. An international field of 30 players will compete across 36 holes for a $ 720,000, unofficial money purse and a first-place prize of $ 108,000.
Headlining the field this week are defending champion Meaghan Francella, Rolex Rankings No. 2 Suzann Pettersen and Rolex Rankings No. 4 Cristie Kerr. Last year, Francella defeated Maria Jose Uribe in a six-hole playoff to secure her second LPGA victory. Also playing this week is 2009 HSBC Brazil Cup Champion, Catriona Matthew.
The buzz surrounding this year's tournament will inevitably be unlike any other with golf set to make its Olympic return in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil in 2016. With 14 different countries represented in this week's field, it will serve as a preview of the international flare and competitive fire that will be present in the 2016 Olympics Games.
Brazilians Luciana Bemvenuti, Maria Iida and Victoria Alimonda head into the week as the hometown favorites. Bemvenuti, the first Brazilian to compete on the LPGA Tour, is from Porto Alegre located 697 miles from Rio de Janiero. Her career-best finish on the LPGA came when she finished tied for fourth at the 1998 Longs Drug Challenge. Alimonda and Iida are both natives of Sao Paulo, Brazil, located about 250 miles from Rio de Janeiro. Iida finished 25th at the 2010 HSBC Brasil Cup while Alimonda will play in her first LPGA event.
The LPGA Futures Tour will be represented this week by Alimonda of Brazil, Paz Echevarria of Chile and Sofi Toccafondi of Argentina. Both Echevarria and Toccafondi are rookies this year while Echevarria is in her second season on the Futures Tour.
Sybase Match Play Championship Tournament Preview
May 16, 2011 by
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The LPGA returns to pristine Hamilton Farm Golf Club in Gladstone, N.J. for the second year of the Sybase Match Play Championship. A field of 64 of the best players on the LPGA will compete for a purse of $ 1.5 million and a first place check of $ 375,000. Competing this week in the unique match-play format are 9 of the Top 10 players in the Rolex Rankings, including Rolex Rankings No. 1 Yani Tseng, No. 2 Jiyai Shin, No. 3 Suzann Pettersen and top-ranked American Cristie Kerr at No. 5.
This is the 11th year that Sybase has been the title sponsor of an LPGA event and the second time that Sybase has titled an event with the match-play format. Sybase previously hosted the Sybase Big Apple Classic at Wykagyl Country Club from 1999 to 2006 and the Sybase Classic Presented by ShopRite at Upper Montclair Country Club in Clifton, New Jersey, from 2007-2009. The tournament will benefit the Somerset Medical Center.
The field is also comprised of the top-48 players on the LPGA Tour's Official Money List and Karrie Webb and Stacy Lewis closing in on Tseng at second and third on that list, respectively. Webb won back-to-back events on Tour earlier this year, marking her 37th and 38th career wins, while Lewis became a Rolex First-Time Winner and a major champion earlier this season at the Kraft Nabisco Championship.
Defending champion Sun Young Yoo will return for this year's Sybase Match Play Championship. Yoo became a Rolex First-Time Winner at last year's event when she defeated Angela Stanford, a four-time winner on Tour, by capturing the 15th and 16th holes to take a 3&1 victory.
Also among the notables in the field is Maria Hjorth, who returns to Hamilton Farm Golf Club after collecting her fifth-career victory at the Avnet LPGA Classic in Mobile, Ala. during the Tour's last stop. Three rookies -- Hee Kyung Seo, Jenny Suh and sponsor's invite Belen Mozo -- will be in the group of 64 players competing in the match-play event as well.
The draw for the Sybase Match Play Championship will once again follow a unique format. The 64 players in the field will be given a number from 1-64 based on their Rolex Rankings. The top-32 players will be automatically seeded into the brackets. Their opponents will be determined through a blind draw.
While this is only the second year of the Sybase Match Play Championship, Hamilton Farm Golf Club is no stranger to LPGA match play events. The club hosted the HSBC Women's Match Play Championship in 2005 and 2006. Marisa Baena captured the first of those championships, while Brittany Lincicome became a Rolex First-Time Winner at the 2006 HSBC Women's Match Play. She defeated Juli Inkster in the title match.
Avnet LPGA Classic Tournament Preview
April 25, 2011 by
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Defending champion and LPGA and World Golf Halls of Fame member Se Ri Pak will headline a star-packed field this week for the Avnet LPGA Classic at the Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail, Magnolia Grove, Crossings Course. Last year, Pak defeated Brittany Lincicome and Suzann Petterson in a playoff to take the 2010 Bell Micro Championship, which was rain-shortened to 54 holes.
A total of 144 players, including nine of the top-10 in the Rolex Rankings, will compete for a purse of $ 1.3 million this week. Rolex Rankings No. 1 Yani Tseng will look to continue her strong hold on the world's top spot. Tseng won the season-opening Honda LPGA Thailand and finished second in the Kraft Nabisco Championship last month, the season's first major. But she has plenty of challengers in the field this week who are looking for their first victory of the 2011 season including Rolex Rankings No. 3 Cristie Kerr, No. 4 Na Yeon Choi, and No. 5 Suzann Petterson.
Stacy Lewis, who became a Rolex First-Time Winner and a major champion by taking a three-stroke victory over Tseng in last month's Kraft Nabisco Championship, will be in the field. Lewis is looking to join Karrie Webb as the second back-to-back winner on Tour this year. Webb captured back-to-back wins at the HSBC Women's Champions in Singapore and the RR Donnelley LPGA Founders Cup.
Also among this year's field for the Avent LPGA Classic is 16-year-old Alexis Thompson, who received one of two sponsor's exemptions. It will be Thompson's first LPGA event in 2011.
This week's Avent LPGA Classic will be the third edition of this tournament in Mobile. The first two years of the event were called the Bell Micro Championship but Avnet, a global technology distributor, acquired Bell Micro in 2010. Angela Stanford won the inaugural Bell Micro Championship in 2008 and she will be in the field again this week. After a year hiatus in 2009, the event returned to Magnolia Grove in 2010 when Pak took the title.
While this particular event has only been held two other times, the Crossings Course played host to the Tournament of Champions from 1999-2007. Players in the field this week who won that event are Paula Creamer, Christina Kim, Dorothy Delasin, Webb and Pak.
Kraft Nabisco Championship Tournament Preview
March 29, 2011 by
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It's a Major! LPGA Tour action continues this week at the Kraft Nabisco Championship, the year's first major championship. A field of 113 players will battle it out for the honor of hoisting the Dinah Shore Trophy and taking the celebratory dive into Poppy's Pond. Defending champion and Rolex Rankings No. 1 Yani Tseng will attempt to win her fourth career major championship at the 40th anniversary of the prestigious championship. Tseng has already won four times world-wide in 2011 including the season-opening Honda LPGA Thailand. Tseng fired rounds of 69-71-67-68 at the 2010 Kraft Nabisco Championship for a one-stroke victory over perennial Kraft contender and Rolex Rankings No. 5 Suzann Pettersen. Pettersen has posted three runner-up finishes in three of the last four editions of the Kraft Nabisco Championship.
Tseng and Pettersen will be joined by the world's best players including top-ranked American and Rolex Rankings No. 3 Cristie Kerr, Rolex Rankings No. 8 and two-time 2011 LPGA Tour winner Karrie Webb and last week's Rolex First-Time Winner Sandra Gal. Kerr is searching for her first Kraft Nabisco title to add a third leg in her quest for the LPGA career Grand Slam, while Webb looks to notch her eighth career major championship title. The field is packed with powerful challengers including Rolex Rankings No. 2 Jiyai Shin, Na Yeon Choi, Michelle Wie, Paula Creamer, Laura Davies and LPGA and World Golf Halls of Fame member Juli Inkster. Players will compete for a total purse of $ 2 million and a first-place prize of $ 300,000.
Another dramatic finish! The 18th hole on the Dinah Shore Course has provided plenty of drama throughout the tournament's 40-year history. In recent years, Brittany Lincicome won the 2010 championship with an eagle on the par-5 finishing hole after reaching the difficult green in two. Morgan Pressel became the youngest player in LPGA history to win an LPGA major with an emotional one-stroke victory over Brittany Lincicome, Catriona Matthew and Suzann Pettersen at the 2007 Kraft Nabisco, while Karrie Webb holed a spectacular wedge on the 72nd hole of the 2006 championship which led to a play-off win against Lorena Ochoa.
Eight former Kraft Nabisco champions are in the field this week - Yani Tseng (2010), Brittany Lincicome (2009), Morgan Pressel (2007), Karrie Webb (2006, 2000), Grace Park (2004), Pat Hurst (1998), Helen Alfredsson (1993) and Juli Inkster (1989).
Six amateurs will compete this week - Kristen Park, Cydney Clanton, Ariya Jutanugarn, Danielle Kang, Lisa McCloskey and Meghan Stasi. The best finish by an amateur in Kraft Nabisco Championship history is a fourth-place finish recorded by Caroline Keggi in 1998 and Michelle Wie in 2003.
Eleven players gained entry into this week's field via their performances at the Kia Classic including Marcy Hart who fired a final-round 65 to tie for seventh in only her second start after giving birth to her first child, LPGA Tour rookies Christel Boeljon and Stephanie Sherlock, and Mindy Kim who posted two top-10 finishes in her last two starts.
Kia Classic Tournament Preview
March 22, 2011 by
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Rolex Rankings No. 1 Yani Tseng headlines a star-studded field at the second-annual Kia Classic this week at Industry Hills Golf Club at Pacific Palms. Tseng, the winner of the season-opening Honda LPGA Thailand, will do battle with a field that features 77 of the top-80 from the 2010 LPGA Official Money List and the top 11 from the current Rolex Rankings.
Tseng will be challenged by LPGA and World Golf Halls of Fame member Karrie Webb who is fresh off back-to-back victories at the HSBC Women's Champions in Singapore and last week's RR Donnelley LPGA Founders Cup, where she edged Brittany Lincicome by one stroke to capture the inaugural title. Webb, who now boasts 38 LPGA victories in her 15-year career, will look to become the first player since Lorena Ochoa (2008) to win three-consecutive events.
Joining Tseng and Webb this week will be defending champion Hee Kyung Seo, who last year was a full-time member of the KLPGA and played as a sponsor exemption. Seo, now a rookie of the 2011 LPGA Tour, called the six-shot victory last season a "turning point" in her golf career.
A cast of players eager to join the 2011 winner's bracket this week includes Rolex Rankings No. 2 Jiyai Shin, No. 3 Cristie Kerr, No. 4 Suzann Pettersen and No. 5 Na Yeon Choi. It will be up to this group to dethrone Tseng as she attempts to distance herself from the pack as a clear world number one. Projections for the Rolex Rankings following the Kia Classic will be available later in the week.
Michelle Wie, a sports-marketing partner of title sponsor Kia, will look for her third victory in three years on the LPGA Tour when she tees it up this week at Industry Hills.
This week's event will be the LPGA's third visit to Industry Hills Country Club following the 1981 and 1982 Olympia Gold Classic, won both years by South African Sally Little.
RR Donnelley LPGA Founders Cup Tournament Preview
March 14, 2011 by
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Yani Tseng |
The LPGA Tour is set to descend upon Wildfire Golf Club at the JW Marriott Desert Ridge Resort and Spa in Phoenix, Arizona, for the inaugural playing of the RR Donnelley LPGA Founders Cup. A field of 134 players including Rolex Rankings No. 1 Yani Tseng, No. 2 Jiyai Shin, No. 5 Cristie Kerr and No. 10 Karrie Webb will compete for a purse of $ 1 million which will be donated entirely to charity. Song-Hee Kim, Morgan Pressel, Christina Kim, Paula Creamer, Laura Davies and LPGA and World Golf Halls of Fame member Juli Inkster will also compete alongside LPGA Tour rookies such as Jessica Korda, Jennifer Song and Belen Mozo.
Tseng enters the RR Donnelley LPGA Founders Cup as the hottest player in the world. She has already won four times world-wide this season, including the ISPS Handa Women's Australian Open and ANZ RACV Ladies Open co-sanctioned by Australian Ladies Professional Golf (ALPG) and the Ladies European Tour (LET) and the season-opening Honda LPGA Thailand on the LPGA Tour. Then the following week, going for four straight, she finished
third at the HSBC Women’s Champions, almost chasing down eventual
winner Webb with a final-day 67.
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The RR Donnelley LPGA Founders Cup is a one-of-a-kind event that will honor the past, celebrate and showcase the present and provide for the future of the game. Come Sunday, $ 500,000 will be donated to the LPGA Foundation and its LPGA-USGA Girls Golf program, and another $ 500,000 to player-designated charities. The $ 500,000 allotted for player-designated charities is a pool which will be distributed to the top-10 finishers with the following breakdown: 1st: $ 200,000; 2nd: $ 100,000; 3rd: $ 55,000; 4th: 40,000; 5th: $ 30,000; 6th: $ 25,000; 7th: $ 20,000; 8th: $ 15,000, 9th: $ 10,000; 10th: $ 5,000.
While LPGA players will forgo tournament earnings in favor of charity, results at the RR Donnelley LPGA Founders Cup will impact the 2011 LPGA Official Money List. Players also will earn points towards Rolex Player of the Year, Louise Suggs Rolex Rookie of the Year, Rolex Rankings and U.S. Solheim Cup team. Scores posted also will count towards the prestigious Vare Trophy.
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Cristie Kerr |
The LPGA Tour returns to Phoenix for the first time since 2009. Phoenix and the LPGA share a rich history with the women’s game. The LPGA has contested events in Phoenix in 36 different years with 28 different winners including one LPGA Founder, Marlene Hagge, and 12 LPGA and World Golf Halls of Fame members. Twenty-time LPGA Tour winner Davies has won the most times in Phoenix, capturing the Standard Register PING in four consecutive years (1994-1997). Webb was the last LPGA player to hoist a trophy in Phoenix in 2009.
While the best players of the present compete this week, the tournament will also feature special appearances by LPGA Founders Louise Suggs, Marilynn Smith and Shirley Spork. Spork will play in the pro-am as will LPGA and World Golf Halls of Fame members Betsy King, Nancy Lopez, Patty Sheehan and Pat Bradley. King, Lopez, Sheehan and Bradley will also kick off the first round in an 18-hole exhibition on the tournament course.
HSBC Women’s Champions – Tournament Preview
February 23, 2011 by
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The LPGA returns to Singapore this week for the fourth-annual HSBC Women's Champions. Tanah Merah Country Club's Garden Course will play host to 63 of the world's best female professional golfers when play gets underway on Thursday. Rolex Rankings No. 1 Yani Tseng has been the talk of the town as she aims to win her fifth event in five starts in 2011. The 22-year-old, who tied for third at last year's HSBC, won the season-opening Honda LPGA Thailand by five strokes last week in addition to back-to-back victories on the Ladies European Tour in Australia in the weeks prior. She added a victory in Taiwan earlier in the year to make it four straight. Japan's Ai Miyazato returns to defend her 2010 title, while Jiyai Shin, the "Champion of Champions" in 2009, also returns to Singapore in hopes of regaining the Rolex Rankings No. 1 she lost to Tseng two weeks ago.
The cream rises to the top in Singapore. In three previous years as a Tour event, the HSBC Women's Champions has lived up to it's name. In 2008, Rolex Rankings No. 1 Lorena Ochoa won the inaugural HSBC Women's Champions by 11 shots. In 2009, Jiyai Shin, who went on to earn Louise Suggs Rolex Rookie of the Year honors, overcame a six-shot deficit to win the Singapore-based event. Last year, Ai Miyazato took home the hardware with two-shot win for her second-consecutive LPGA victory. All three players have been Rolex Rankings No. 1 in their careers. |
Honda LPGA Thailand – Tournament Preview
February 15, 2011 by
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The Honda LPGA Thailand marks the launch of the 2011 LPGA Tour season and a renewed battle for the Rolex Rankings No. 1 spot that sizzled in 2010.
Last year's Honda champion Ai Miyazato will attempt her first title defense of the season this week at Siam Country Club's Old Course outside Pattaya, Thailand. Miyazato, who famously chipped-in for birdie on the 72nd hole of last year's event to defeat Suzann Pettersen by one shot, shot 21-under-par 267 over four days of play in 2010. She went on to win four events in 2010 and held the top spot in the world rankings for 11 weeks.
Pettersen, who is currently No. 3 in the Rolex Rankings, recorded five additional runner-up finishes in 2010 and is seeking her first victory since the 2009 CN Canadian Women's Open. She won the 2007 Honda LPGA Thailand for her career-best fifth victory in the 2007 season.
Other top names likely to be in contention include Rolex Rankings No. 1 Yani Tseng, who won the ISPS Handa Women's Australian Open and the ANZ RACV Ladies Masters on the Ladies European Tour (LET), and No. 2 Jiyai Shin.
Shin recorded the seventh and eighth victories of her LPGA career last season and became just the third player (Annika Sorenstam, Lorena Ochoa) to finish a Tour season as Rolex Rankings No. 1.
Tseng finished third at the 2010 Honda LPGA Thailand six shots off Miyazato's pace. The 22-year-old added Rolex Player of the Year honors to her ever-growing resume last year following a three-win season. She has three major championships to her credit and needs only the U.S. Women's Open to round out the Career Grand Slam.
Rolex Rankings No. 4 and top-ranked American Cristie Kerr will also tee it up this week this week in Thailand with hopes of improving on her tie for fourth last season. Kerr became the first American to top the Rolex Rankings last year following her dominant 12-stroke victory at the LPGA Championship Presented by Wegmans. She also became just the fifth player in LPGA history to eclipse the $ 12 million mark in 2010.
Other notables in the field include 2010 U.S. Women's Open champion Paula Creamer, who last year withdrew following the first round in Thailand with the thumb injury that led to surgery and several months of rehab, 2010 LPGA Official Money List winner Na Yeon Choi and heralded rookie Jessica Korda, who is one of eight sponsor exemptions in the field this week.
Sneak Preview of Kia’s Super Bowl ad
February 5, 2011 by
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[unable to retrieve full-text content]Travel through space and time as a policeman, villain, Poseidon, alien and ancient chief try to get their hands on the all‐new Optima. Prepare for "One Epic Ride".
LPGA.com News & Entertainment
Tune In: LPGA Year in Review and 2011 LPGA Tour Preview
December 22, 2010 by
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