Samsung – 1st Round

Rookie of the Year Angela Park and Paula Creamer carded 67s and share the first-round lead at the Samsung World Championship. Mi Hyun Kim, Lorena Ochoa and Morgan Pressel are tied for third, one shot back.

Creamer played bogey-less golf while Park overcame bogeys at 9 and 13 by birdying the last two holes. Ochoa led at -6 until she had to take an unplayable lie at 18 and wound up with double-bogey. Kim was +2 through 10 but birdied six of the last eight. Pressel was even through 11, then birdied four of the next five. The rest of the scores are:

69 Jeong Jang, Se Ri Pak
70 Angela Stanford, Jee Young Lee
71 Suzann Pettersen
72 Maria Hjorth, Sarah Lee, Stacy Prammanasudh
73 Nicole Castrale, Seon Hwa Lee
74 Brittany Lincicome
75 Ai Miyazato, Cristie Kerr
76 Bettina Hauert
79 Michelle Wie

To me, the only real surprises on Day One were the poor round by Kerr (although that’s becoming less of surprise than it used to be) and the outstanding round by Kim. Peanut withdrew from Longs with back problems. She said in her post-round interview that her back is still sore and has been bothering her for a few weeks. She had an MRI done in Korea recently and mentioned a disk problem which requires her to stretch and warm up more than usual.

I did expect a poor round from Wie and unfortunately was correct. The commentators seemed in agreement that rust was Michelle’s major issue, especially with the putter. It wasn’t a great 18th birthday for her.