2007 Kolon-Hana Bank Championship

The action started on Friday, October 19th. The weather was actually rather nice considering the time of year. Nonetheless, the course was challenging, and good scores were at a premium. By the end of the round, only six players would be under par, four of them Korean.

One of the two best scores of the day was turned in by Meena Lee (pictured). Meena has struggled a lot in 2007, after two great years to start her LPGA career. It's not really clear entirely why she has not done well of late, but returning to Korea, where she was once the top player on tour, seemed to have done wonders for her game. She shot a 3 under par 69, to tie for the lead with none other than Suzann Pettersen, who continued her hot play of late.

This course seemed to be a welcome medicine for several former KLPGA top players, at least in the first round. Soo-Yun Kang, who led the league for a couple of years back at the turn of the decade, has been struggling far worse lately than even Meena Lee has. But she turned in a strong front nine that got her to 2 under par at one point, before she faded to her eventual finish of one over par. Even that score was good for a tie for 13th after the first round. Joo Mi Kim, yet another former KLPGA top player, was one of the few players under par on this day; she shot a 71.

Korean megastar Se Ri Pak, herself once the top player on the KLPGA, also turned in a respectable round, an even par 72. Pak was in fact on course to do far better than that, but had a lot of trouble coming in. She was paired on this day with Ochoa and Gulbis, insuring a huge gallery for the three stars. Pak was doing well, getting to 2 under par, although she was not able to cash in on the par 5 16th hole despite reaching the green in two. On that same hole, Ochoa hit a bad drive, hit her approach near the cart path, hit a bad third well right of the green, and pitched her fourth to about thirty feet away. Yet she still made par, the same score Se Ri had, when she drained that lengthy par saving putt.

Pak then hit a drive on 17 that at first looked decent, but ended up slicing well left. It landed in some trees just off the fairway. The brush was so thick that it took her some time to decide how to hit her next shot. She considered taking an unplayable, but finally worked her way into the trees and chipped the ball out. Her third shot came up short of the green, but in pretty good position. It looked like she might be able to save bogey. But then she made a really silly mistake. Her ball had landed in ground under repair, so she took a drop from there. Due to wet conditions, they were playing lift, clean and place. So Se Ri next picked up the ball to do that, when one of her playing partners pointed out that she was not allowed to do that. Turned out that she had dropped the ball in the rough, which meant she was not allowed to lift it. She called a referee in, and the ref confirmed that this was true. So, Se Ri got a one stroke penalty and wound up with a double bogey on the hole. That 17th hole was not very kind to Se Ri on this day. But Ochoa would also wind up with an even par total, so for the moment, both players were looking up at Pettersen.

Besides Pettersen and Lee, the next best players on the leaderboard were at one under, including the aforementioned Joo Mi Kim. Two other Korean golfers also finished at that score: Jeong Jang and Hyun Hee Moon. JJ had been playing well most of the second half of the season, but had been unable to put it all together in a single week to get the win. She was obviously hoping to change that trend here. Honey Moon, meanwhile, was actually a rookie on the LPGA tour, but had focused on the KLPGA in 2007, because she only had non-exempt status on the LPGA. She had had a good year on the KLPGA, but had not won an event. She now found herself within 2 shots of possibly becoming the next KLPGA star to breakthrough at this tournament.

Several other KLPGA players had good first day scores at the tournament as well. All eyes were on top KLPGA star Ji Yai Shin, who had a so so first round, a one over par 73. But Shin is known for starting slowly, and she was only four shots out of the lead, so anything might yet happen. The other top KLPGA players, Eun-Hee Ji and Sun Ju Ahn, shot 2 over par and even par respectively. Na Yeon Choi, who was trying to qualify for the LPGA at Q-School, also shot a 74, while Hee Young Park, another LPGA hopeful, could only manage a 3 over par score on this day.

The Korean rookies on the LPGA tour had a wide range of scores on day one. Angela Park (pictured), recently named the Rookie of the Year for the LPGA, was getting a fair amount of attention from the media. This was to be her first ever tournament played in Korea, and she was excited about it. But for whatever reason, she was not able to get her game in gear. On this first day, she shot a fairly disastrous 6 over par 78 which put her near the bottom of the leaderboard. Her good friend and fellow rookie Inbee Park suffered similarly, also shooting a 78, while rookies Jane Park and In-Kyung Kim shot 75s. But all was not bad for the Korean rookies: Ji-Young Oh shot a strong even par round that left her in a tie for 7th after one round. Oh, one of the youngest players on tour, had a terrible start to her season, missing most of the cuts in tournaments she played, but has surged somewhat since claiming her first top ten at the Safeway Classic in August. She looked well on her way to another top performance here.

Some of the other Koreans who produced good rounds included Seon Hwa Lee, who shot a 72; Shin Hyun Ahn and Birdie Kim, who tied Shin at one over par; and Gloria Park and Kimmie, who were at 2 over. Perhaps the most surprising results, however, came at the bottom of the field. Da Ye Na, a fairly solid KLPGA golfer, shot the very worst round of the day, an 11 over par 83. But just ahead of her was Christina Kim, who produced an 81. It's hard to understand what went wrong with Christina; she has been playing great golf for the most part since the Safeway. Christina's woes primarily came down to two holes. She scored a 7 on the par 4 1st hole, and a jaw dropping 11 on the par 5 third. On just those two holes, she was 9 over par; the rest of the day, she was even par. So even though she wasn't going to win this one, at least she had to feel good knowing that she was playing well most of the time. Another surprising result was turned in by the defending champion, who in 2006 was brilliant on this same course. Jin Joo Hong earned her way onto the LPGA with her win here, but on this day she shot a miserable 9 over par 81 to sit tied second to last with Christina and Canadian Lorie Kane. There was not going to be a repeat champion at this event this year.

In round two, the conditions took a turn for the much worse. The weather got a lot colder, and the wind kicked up big time. As a result, the scores ballooned, although a few players were still able to keep their scores under par even at the end of this day. Still, there were some surprising casualties as well. Se Ri Pak is renowned for her ability to rise to the occasion in tough conditions; she did, after all, make top tens in three of the four Majors this year. The year she won this event, the conditions were arguably as tough as in any LPGA event in history. But for whatever reason, Se Ri was not able to handle the course on this day. She shot a 4 over par 76 to fall into a tie for 18th. Ochoa, who was playing with Pak for the second day, did only slightly better, shooting a 75 to fall out of the top ten. She looked set up for one of her worst finishes of the year if she did not sharpen up quickly. Even Ji Yai Shin, who has been destroying the KLPGA tour in all types of conditions all year, could not handle the weather on this day. She shot a 76 of her own, one of her worst scores of the year, to fall outside the top 20. Shin had not finished outside the top 20 at any tournament in Korea since turning pro in 2006, so this was truly a remarkable result. It seems like she has her worst results in really windy conditions, something she may need to work on. This year, her three worst tournaments - the SBS Open, the Women's British Open, and this one - all had in common tough, windy conditions.

Among the carnage, some players had some good rounds, and one had a truly great one. That great round was turned in by Eun-Hee Ji (pictured below). Ji had done well in tough conditions at the British Women's Open, scoring a top five finish there, but she played even better on this day. On a day where even superstars were shooting over par, she produced a nearly miraculous 4 under par 68 to vault into solo second place at 2 under par total. She was close to taking the outright lead, but Pettersen was too tough. At one point, the Norwegian star had moved to 5 under par and looked ready to blow the field away, but she made two late bogies to drop back to 3 under total. It was the first time in the history of this event that a non-Korean had had the outright lead in this tournament after a round. But by no means did she have the win locked up.