Chun opens with 64, leads women’s major by five
In Gee Chun is alone atop the Women’s PGA Championship following a sensational start.
In fact, no player has ever been further ahead after 18 holes at a women’s major.
Chun breezed to an 8-under-par 64 on Thursday to take a five-stroke advantage after the first round at Congressional in Bethesda, Md. While most of the field slogged through the day on the wet Blue Course, Chun birdied seven of eight holes during one stretch. She was seven shots ahead when she finished her round and ended up tying a record for the largest 18-hole lead at a major.
Mickey Wright led this tournament by five after the first round in 1961.
“I don’t know what golf course In Gee is playing,” defending champion Nelly Korda said after finishing her round of 71.
Chun was playing the same course as everyone else — one that went through a full restoration last year. There was heavy rain in the area overnight and more precipitation during play Thursday morning. That softened the course but also made Congressional’s length — 6,809 yards for this first round — more of a factor.
No big deal for Chun, a two-time major winner.
“The course, after a lot of rain, feels longer,” Chun said. “At the same time, greens were softer. So I think it was just a balance.”
Although there was plenty of golf left to play, Chun’s big lead certainly turned heads.
“I can’t stop staring at the leaderboard,” Justin Thomas tweeted. “Leading by 7 halfway thru day 1 !!!! ”
Pornanong Phatlum and Hye-Jin Choi shot bogey-free rounds of 69 to cut Chun’s lead to five, but that was still a big enough advantage to tie Wright’s mark. The 1961 tournament was one of a record four victories by Wright at this event. Chun is trying for her first.
Chun did set a major championship record — for men or women — when she won the Evian Championship in 2016 at 21-under.
PGA Tour: Rory McIlroy fought off a sinus bug to shoot an 8-under 62 for a share of the first-round lead with J.T. Poston in the Travelers Championship in Cromwell, Conn.
Coming off a fifth-place tie Sunday in the U.S. Open after winning the Canadian Open the previous week, the secondranked McIlroy had a bogeyfree morning round — highlighted by a 47-foot birdie putt on the par-4 seventh.
McIlroy matched the lowest opening round of his PGA Tour career. He finished with a tap-in birdie on the ninth hole after a 332-yard drive and 44-foot chip just past the pin.
“It’s like U.S. Open rehab coming here,” the four-time major champion said. “I like coming here the week after the U.S. Open, it sort of gives you an opportunity to shoot low scores and get after it.”
Poston had five consecutive birdies on Nos. 13-17 and made the turn at 6-under 29. He parred the first six holes on the front nine and birdied Nos. 7 and 9 to cap a bogey-free round.
Xander Schauffele and Martin Laird were a stroke back.
European tour: Li Haotong shot a 10-under 62 for a oneshot lead over Daan Huizing after the first round of the BMW International Open in Munich.
Li tied the course record, finishing the round with his second eagle of the day on the par-5 ninth hole after a big approach shot left him a 4-foot putt.