Wie struggles with putter at Publinx
Associated Press
LONG GROVE, Ill. — Michelle Wie had a long day in the first round of stroke play at the U.S. Women's Amateur Public Links Championship yesterday.
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Wie, 11, of Honolulu, the youngest player to ever qualify for a USGA women's amateur event, opened with a 12-over-par 84 that included 41 putts at the 6,110-yard Kemper Lakes Golf Club course.
Eleven-year-old Michelle Wie of Hawai'i shot a 12-over-par 84 on the opening day of the U.S. Women's Amateur Public Links Championship yesterday.
"I usually putt better, I just couldn't read the greens," she said.
Wie was a single-digit handicap player at age 8 and broke par a year later. She first qualified for the Women's Amateur Public Links last year at the age of 10 and advanced to match play, but lost in the first round. The 5-foot-9 Wie has recorded two measured drives of 360 yards.
Candie Kung, a 19-year-old native of Taiwan who lives in Monterey Park, Calif., shot a 1-under-par 71 yesterday and held a two-shot lead.
Kung had four birdies — two on chip-ins — and three bogeys, and was two strokes ahead of Lynda Upton of Carson City, Nev., and Aimee Cho of Orlando, Fla.
Kung, who will be a junior at the University of Southern California, won the individual title at the Pac-10 championship this year and was an NCAA first-team All-American.
Upton, who just graduated from Nevada-Reno, had a chance to tie for the lead, but double-bogeyed the 18th hole.
The second round of qualifying is today and the field will then be cut to the low 64 for match play. The 18-hole final will be Sunday.
The Women's Amateur Public Links is one of 13 national championships conducted by the U.S. Golf Association, of which 10 are strictly for amateurs.
