LPGA Championship 2003: The Young Ones

The rookie class of 2003 is chock full o' Koreans, and two of them had fantastic if largely unreported tournaments at this year's second Major. They are the Young Ones: Young Kim and Young-A Yang, and are two very different success stories.

Young-A Yang came to the US from Korea as a teenager, and played for four years at the University of Tennessee. She was one of the top players in the college ranks, but little suggested that she could be a major force out on the LPGA. She managed a surprise exempt card at Q School, beating the more heralded college Korean, Jimin Kang, who only got conditional status. But her results so far this year have been much what you would expect from a new professional. In other words, she has missed her fair share of cuts. After a few events, things started to get better for her. At the Chick-Fil-A she got out to a great start, finishing the first round in a tie for tenth, but shot an 80 in round two and missed the cut. She then made her first cut at the Michelob Light Open the next week, but finished 72nd, well back of the pack. Finally, at the Corning Classic, she played four good rounds of golf to finish in a tie for 33rd.

Meet the Young Ones: Young-A Yang (left) and
Young Kim (right)
Reuters/Frank Polich

Still, nothing prepared us for this week. Her first two days were not the kind of scores that would normally gain you notice, but on a Major course, scores of 73 and 74 were good enough to easily make the cut. On the weekend, however, she turned it up a notch, and in wet conditions with nonetheless blazing fast greens, she managed a pair of 69s to not only acquire her first top ten in any LPGA event, but to get it in the first Major she had ever played (she did not qualify for the Nabisco). How much of an effect on her confidence this will have is unclear, but it did provide her with a nice paycheck of over $40,000, and vaulted her up the money list. Just a couple more performances like this will be all she will need to secure her card for next season.

Young Kim, on the other hand, played much of her golf in Korea, with a stint on the Futures Tour in the middle. Like a lot of Koreans coming over to play in America, she has had a bit of an adjustment period while she is getting used to tour life. But she showed a lot of potential right off the bat, with a top ten finish at Q School, then a 9th place finish at her first ever LPGA event. After that she cooled down a little; occasionally she would produce a good round or two, but her finishes were generally out of the spotlight.

At the McDonald's, however, she played solidly for four rounds. Her first round was particularly impressive, a 1 under 70 that for a time looked like it could be even lower. This left her only a few shots out of the lead. She struggled a bit in the next two rounds, but still kept her final scores close enough to par to keep her within earshot of her second top ten of the year. It was in the final round where she really stepped it up. She played beautifully. On a day where most of the players were going over par (including the eventual winner), Young was 2 under much of the day. Coming to the final hole, she had a long chip when her approach shot left her short of the green. She hit a beauty to within about 4 feet. The par save would have given her a tie for third place, a fantastic finish, but alas, she just missed it and had to settle for 6th. Still, this is her career best finish on tour, and the fact it happened in a Major should, like with Yang, give her plenty to build on in the next few months.

This finish also moved Young to fourth in the Rookie of the Year standings, but within only a few points of #2 Christina Kim, who missed the cut, and just one point behind Suzann Pettersen. Though she would still have some way to go to catch #1 Lorena Ochoa, she has definitely made a name for herself and will hopefully continue to do so.

Young Kim in round 1
AP Photo/Pat Crowe II