Minjee Lee of Australia carded a bogey-free, 5-under-par 67 to rise to the top of the first-round leaderboard at the ISPS Handa Women’s Scottish Open on Thursday in Ayrshire, Scotland.
After wet weather led to multiple delays to the proceedings at Dundonald Links, 42 golfers were still on the course when play was suspended for darkness at around 9:10 p.m. local time.
By that point, Lee had moved in front of Megan Khang and South Korea’s A Lim Kim, tied for second at 4-under 68. England’s Lily May Humphreys was 4 under through 12 holes.
Lee, a two-time major champion, went out in 2 under before adding birdies at Nos. 10, 13, 14 and 18, the latter two on par-5 holes. She’s on the hunt for her first victory of 2024.
“I like the creativity of links golf,” Lee said. “You know, obviously there was a lot of wind today so it was playing like a true links kind of golf course. Sometimes we don’t get as much wind but today was blowing a gale and I feel like just picturing the shots and just having to execute those shots, I think is — I didn’t find it fun to play. Just when you execute it correctly, you get rewarded.”
Earlier in the day, Khang stood near a puddle off the green and holed an unlikely chip-in birdie at the par-5 fifth hole, her 14th hole of the day, to take the lead. She made her sixth and final birdie of the day at No. 7 to set the lead at 4 under.
“I walked up to my ball after the poor second shot and my heels were kind of in a little standing water and I was joking, like, ‘I don’t really care where my feet are.’ I hit a lovely chip and very lucky to have got it to drop,” said Khang, who has won just once on the LPGA Tour to date.
Khang said she was running behind Thursday morning before finding out the start of the round was delayed by an hour.
“So thankfully I didn’t have to get wet and come back in,” Khang said. “Obviously we had to do that with the mid round delay but that’s going to happen. But I’m very happy we were able to finish the round and kind of gets me done for the day.”
New Zealand’s Lydia Ko, fresh off winning gold at the Paris Olympics for her third Olympic medal since 2016, opened the tournament with a 3-under 69 that featured five birdies.
Like many golfers, she sees this week as a useful tune-up for the Women’s British Open, which are taking place next week at St. Andrews.
“It’s part of our job. We have to get acclimated to the weather, the type of golf course, the type of grass,” Ko said.
“So we just — I think it kind of depends who adjusts the best in a short amount of time … We have two weeks over here playing links-style golf courses, so all in all it’s great preparation for next week, even though this is a different style of course to St Andrews.”
Lauren Coughlin, Japan’s Ayaka Furue and South Africa’s Nicole Garcia also shot 69, and Lucy Li was at 3 under through 15 holes.
Among other notables, Rose Zhang and Ireland’s Leona Maguire opened with 1-over 73s.
–Field Level Media
