Karis Davidson and Minjee Lee shot two-under-par 69s on Thursday (Friday AEST) at Riviera Country Club to be in a six-way tie for eighth.<\/p>\n
Compatriots Hannah Green and Stephanie Kyriacou are a further stroke back, Grace Kim (72) is one over and Sarah Hammett (80) nine over.<\/p>\n
Lee’s bogey-free first round of the second women’s major of the year was highlighted by birdies on the first and ninth holes.<\/p>\n
The 156-player field are fighting for the $US12 million ($A17 million) in prize money and American Jennifer Kupcho leads the way, her five-under 66 earning a one-stroke lead over South Korea’s Sei Young Kim.<\/p>\n
The 29-year-old Kupcho, who has four career LPGA Tour wins but just one since 2022, made seven birdies and two bogeys.<\/p>\n
“I just really, really like the golf course,” said Kupcho, who missed the cut in her three previous US Open starts.<\/p>\n
“It’s kind of a ball-striker’s paradise. Just hit it down the fairway, hit it on the green and make the putts.”<\/p>\n
The entire field managed just one eagle in the first round – Allisen Corpuz holed out with a six-iron from 86 yards on the 17th.<\/p>\n
Mexico’s Gaby Lopez and Japan’s Hinako Shibuno joined South Korea’s Hyunjo Yoo, Ina Yoon and Minji Kang in the group at 68.<\/p>\n
World No.1 Nelly Korda (73) made a rough start, struggling off the tee to finish two over.<\/p>\n
“It wasn’t a great day,” Korda said.<\/p>\n
“I hit it really good Monday through Wednesday, so I have honestly no idea where this came from. So I’m going to go to the range.”<\/p>\n
Aphrodite Deng, a 16-year-old amateur, was in contention for the lead before playing two late holes at three over and carding a 70.<\/p>\n
Deng was born in Canada to Chinese parents before growing up in New Jersey and eventually settling in Florida.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A competitive child figure skater for several years before the COVID-19 pandemic, Deng took up golf only seven years ago, but won the US Girls’ Junior last year.\u00a0<\/p>\n
– with the AP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Karis Davidson and Minjee Lee shot two-under-par 69s on Thursday (Friday AEST) at Riviera Country Club to be…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":716315,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[566],"tags":[64,63,755,85],"class_list":["post-716314","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-golf","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/716314","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=716314"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/716314\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/716315"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=716314"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=716314"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=716314"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}