Karen Stupples, Maria Hjorth and Shin-Ae Ahn share the first round lead of the Evian Masters
A group of three players surged to the top of the leaderboard on the first day of Evian Masters, presented by Société Générale, at the Evian Golf Club in France. Englishwoman Karen Stupples, Swede Maria Hjorth and Korean Shin-Ae Ahn posted rounds of five-under,
67 on the first day to share the lead at the top.
Players battered the frequent heavy downpours throughout the day especially in the morning. Stupples, the 2004 British Open champion opened up her bid with a disappointing bogey on the sixth and a double-bogey on the ninth hole in the front nine, but made
the turn to pull in six birdies to make up for the loss.
“Obviously the weather was pretty grim to start with. I think it took a while to get used to that. I just hit it out of bounds,” explained the 38-year-old Stupples from Deal in Kent. “but I knew it wasn’t going to hurt me too bad because I was hitting my
irons well and I just figured that I would make it up.”
Hjorth played what could be her career-best round on the first day, pulling in no fewer than eight straight birdies both in the front and back nine. However, the player succumbed to three consecutive bogeys before closing her round with five-under.
“I played very solid. Obviously it’s hard with these greens, because they spin a lot, or I spin the ball a lot, so it’s difficult to get the ball close to the hole,” said Hjorth, who has six professional victories in her stellar career and recently won the
Avnet Classic on LPGA.
Japanese Ai Miyazato carded her first round of 68 in the tough playing conditions alongside several other players including Ritsuko Ryu and Miki Saiki, Americans Cristie Kerr, Brittany Lincicome and Shanshan Feng of China. Miyazato won the 2009 episode of
the event, bagging the biggest prize money on the Ladies European Tour.
Defending champion Jiyai Shin of South Korea pulled in a round of 69 to share the 10th place alongside World No.1 Yani Tseng from Chinese Taipei and Virginie Lagoutte-Clement from France.
Top ranking players on the LET Money List, Caroline Hedwall and Christel Boeljon had a comparatively disappointing day with their over-par scores of 73 and will have to perform better in the second round to survive the halfway cut.
Evian Masters is one of the biggest events on the LET and LPGA and was recently given the status of the fifth major in Ladies Golf, starting from 2013. The decision was promulgated on Wednesday, July 20, before the Pro-Am session of the 18th edition
of the Evian Masters.
It was also announced that the Evian Masters Golf Club course will undergo a thorough renovation before the 2013 instalment of the event to raise the difficulty bar for the major event.
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