2005 Longs Drugs Challenge

The Longs Drugs Challenge is an event with a nice tradition of Korean success. Always played in the Sacramento area, it has moved around a bit in its short history. But whichever course it has been to, it often seems to feature a Korean making some noise come Sunday afternoon.

In 2001, the event was held in the spring. That year, Annika Sorenstam had started her climb to retake the top of the women's game by winning four straight events coming into the Longs, including the year's first Major. In the process, she had also shot the first 59 in LPGA history. Her victim at two of these events had been Se Ri Pak, who had finished second both at the first and the second events in her run of four. But Se Ri got the last laugh on Annika when she defeated her at the Longs, thus ending her streak at four events. The event had been shortened due to bad weather, and Annika would not show up at the Longs again until this year.

The next year, Se Ri played well in her title defense, but it looked as though Cristie Kerr was going to run away with the title. Meanwhile, a little know Korean player named Hee-Won Han was also playing well. When Kerr started to make mistakes and tumble back to the field, Han suddenly found herself tied for the lead with one hole to play. Hee-Won had never been in this situation on the LPGA tour before, and she hit her drive into a golf cart (!) and wound up bogeying the final hole. Kerr barely escaped with her own first win on tour.

Se Ri Pak claimed the Longs trophy in 2001

Christina Kim held on tightly to her trophy
after claiming the 2004 Longs Drugs

In 2003, the event was moved to the Fall, and to a new course. The course was not really ready for primetime, and it would be moved again in 2004. That year, Se Ri Pak, Grace Park and Jung Yeon Lee all played well enough to have a shot at the win, but none of them made the final crucial putt to put it away, and they wound up tied for second, one shot out of the lead by eventual winner Helen Alfredsson.

Which brings us to 2004. Coming into this event, Christina Kim had been playing extremely well, but had not been able to collect a trophy. She had come heartbreakingly close at the State Farm Classic a few weeks earlier, shooting the second best score in the history of the event, but still losing to Cristie Kerr when she missed a four foot par putt on the final hole. (Kerr has a history of thwarting Korean golfers; she also beat another Korean, Seol-An Jeon, in a seven hole play-off in 2004). Christina seized the lead in round one at the Longs, however, and played wonderfully the rest of the week. But she had not been able to shake Karrie Webb, and coming into the final hole, watched as Webb had an 8 foot birdie to tie. Webb somehow missed it, and Christina got her first (and thus far only) LPGA win. It was made all the more sweet because it took place in front of what almost amounted to her hometown fans (she grew up in San Jose, California, a few hours away from Sacramento). Christina's antics as she pumped herself and the crowd up had certainly made her memorable; what could the Longs Drugs Challenge do for an encore?

Remember when we talked about Cristie Kerr, and her way of thwarting the Koreans? Well, in 2005 she managed to upstage everybody on the first day of the event. After starting with two bogies early on, she turned on the jets and went absolutely wild, at one point making an eagle on a par 5, then sinking an eagle from the fairway on the very next hole. Even when she hit into the woods, she snaked it out and made birdie. She wound up with a 9 under par 62 to start the event, giving everyone else a tough target to aim for.

And, indeed, none of the Koreans was able to come close to that, although several put up decent starts nonetheless. Young Kim, who had been taking a few weeks off, responded with a 4 under par 67, and defending champ Christina Kim and Il Mi Chung both notched 3 under par 68s. Meena Lee put together a 2 under par round, as did Shi Hyun Ahn.

But two players who looked ready to continue their hot streaks hit speed bumps. Soo-Yun Kang, who had only a few days earlier finished second in the prolonged Office Depot (it had ended on Monday of that very week), had her score to 4 under before she produced a triple bogey on the par 5 15th (all the more surprising, since this came after three straight birdies). She never really got it going again after that, and though she made the cut, had a pretty poor finish in the end.

The other player was Hee-Won Han, who had nearly won the event in 2002. Hee-Won had won the Office Depot, but that must have taken something out of her, as she only managed a 2 over par 73 on this first day, leaving her in a tie for 79th place and in danger of missing the cut.

Hee-Won's try for her first win in 2002
came to an end when her drive
ended up in a golf cart...

After a terrible round 1, Hee-Won
rallied big time

Everything became completely topsy turvy in round 2. Hee-Won, who had struggled so much in round one, caught fire in a huge way. Suddenly, her fantastic irons were spot on again. She even made her first eagle of the year at the par 5 15th. She would have seven more birdies, and only a single bogey, to shoot an 8 under par 63. This was the low round of the day, and she pole vaulted from 79th to 9th on the leaderboard. Instead of being an also-ran, Hee-Won had set herself up to contend.

Cristie Kerr, meanwhile, was going along fine... until she hit that selfsame par 5 15th. Then she suddenly couldn't keep the ball out of trouble. She had made eagle there on day one, but on day two she had a crushing quad bogey 9. She tumbled down the leaderboard, eventually shooting a +4 round, and wound up falling all the way from 11 under par, where she was when the quad occurred, to +1, where she ended on Sunday. An astonishing drop, to be sure.

The leaders after round 2 was at 9 under: Dawn Coe-Jones. But both Christina Kim and Hee-Won sat at 6 under going into the weekend, well in the fight. Shi Hyun Ahn had climbed to 5 under, and looked prime for her best finish in some time. Even Young Kim, who shot a one over par 72 on day two for a 3 under par total, was still quite capable of catching up. Would the Longs prove kind to the Korean ladies again?