MISSISSAUGA, Ont. \u2014 The only person who can feel the kind of pressure Brooke Henderson is under at the CPKC Women\u2019s Open is Brooke Henderson. But now, in her 11th year as a pro, the support at this event often acts as the elixir she needs for success.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Friday at the Mississaugua Golf and Country Club, Henderson did seemingly everything right \u2014 for the first time all season \u2014 and fired a 5-under 66 to move into the top five on the leaderboard through the morning wave, with what seemed like every fan on the property, young and old, in full voice.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
The 2018 winner of this event closed with four birdies in her last seven holes, including two in a row on Nos. 17 and 18 \u2014 slippery mid-range putts, both \u2014 to come into the house and firmly in the mix through 36 holes.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cAfter shooting 5-under you feel like, \u2018Oh, yeah, close is here.\u2019 But I’m right there. Just got to keep going, put two more solid rounds together. This week it’s been nice because when things haven’t worked out well, I’ve been able to be gritty and get up and down, and I’m really proud of that,\u201d Henderson told Sportsnet.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of things have gone correctly the last couple days.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Henderson, who switched putters at the beginning of the week to a different mallet model from TaylorMade, needed just 28 putts in her second round. Statistically, it was as tidy an effort as she could have asked for \u2014 she missed just two fairways and three greens. Henderson\u2019s ball-striking is the part of her game that always sets her up for success, and Friday \u2014 in fairly calm conditions \u2014 she was dialled in thanks to a mental pivot Thursday evening.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cDefinitely clearing the mind is always a huge one for me, especially lately. And also, I started to gain some momentum the last three or four holes yesterday. Started to hit more greens and some better birdie opportunities, so I feel like that gave me a little bit of confidence going into today,\u201d Henderson said.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cJust tried to have a better mindset and be a little bit more determined and it’s worked out.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Canadian hasn\u2019t found the winner\u2019s circle on the LPGA Tour since January of 2023 and has slid to No. 58 in the world rankings, her worst-such mark since she turned professional in 2015. Coming into the week, Henderson had notched just one top-10 finish this season, and it wasn\u2019t even in a stroke-play event.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Not only does Henderson want to have a good result this week in front of the Canadian faithful, but it comes at a great time of the season to put a high finish on the board as she looks to lock up her spot in November\u2019s CME Group Tour Championship \u2014 the season-finale that features just the top 60 in the season-long points race.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
The CPKC Women\u2019s Open, despite the fact that it travels around the country each year, has been a solid spot for Henderson to play well. Since 2016, she has just one finish outside the top 15 at Canada\u2019s national open.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Henderson is tied for fifth and just four back of the early Friday lead held by Akie Iwai, who won last week\u2019s LPGA Tour event in Portland. Minjee Lee, a winner already this year, Leona Maguire, and world No. 1 Jeeno Thitikul are 6-under and tied for second.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cAny time you can see your name near the top of the leaderboard it’s always a great feeling. I know there will be a lot of movement this afternoon once the rest of the crowd goes out, but definitely solid way to start the morning,\u201d Henderson said. \u201cFeel like I’m so excited to be playing the weekend in front of these amazing fans, and just hopefully I can give them some more to cheer about tomorrow.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MISSISSAUGA, Ont. \u2014 The only person who can feel the kind of pressure Brooke Henderson is under at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":89388,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[443],"tags":[49,48,622,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-89387","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golf","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-golf","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89387","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=89387"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89387\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/89388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=89387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=89387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=89387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}