Round two of the Four Winds Invitational is complete, despite some rain showers in the afternoon and early evening. Yan Liu shot 1-under on the day to hold her lead. While she’s excited to have her name on the top of the leaderboard, Liu realizes there’s still a job to be done.
“I’m a professional golfer,” Liu said with a smile. “I need to do professional things.”
Liu walked off the course today 9-under for the tournament. She carded five birdies on her round, which balanced out her two bogeys and lone double bogey to start her day.
“Golf is sometimes hard and sometimes easy,” said Liu. “Today was hard, but yesterday was easy for me.”
Liu plans to keep a similar mindset to her first two rounds for the final 18. She focuses on her shots, her game and tries to stay patient as much as possible.
“Golf is a long game,” said Liu. “We have five hours on the course. I just try to relax and stay patient.”
Two strokes behind Liu, in solo second was Gabby Lemieux. The Idaho native put together a 6-under round, the low round of the day, to be in contention at 7-under.
“It feels like a long time coming,” said Lemieux. “I’ve missed a lot of cuts over the last five events. To go from basically the bottom to the top, knowing that I’ve put all this work in, I feel like I’m still there. It’s nice to see it all come together.”
Lemieux went bogey-free on the front nine and carded seven birdies on the day. Her plan for the final round is to do it all again.
“Tomorrow I’m going to wake up and do the exact same thing I did the last two days,” said Lemieux after her second round. “I have to stay patient, and I think that’s the one thing I did today regardless of the score. I’m just trying to take one step at a time, because I feel like that’s usually when everybody plays their best golf.”
Selena Costabile sits in solo third, at 6-under. The Canadian shot 2-under on the round, carding three birdies and a bogey-free back nine.
“I actually only had 22 putts today,” said Costabile. “So that was the best part of my game. I tried to stay patient and keep it one shot at a time.”
Rounding out the top-5 was Roberta Liti in solo third and five players tied for fifth. Liti’s 1-under round consisted of three birdies, and she sits four strokes behind Liu at 5-under. Dottie Ardina, Kim Kaufman, Michelle Piyapattra, Pinyada Kuvanun and Vivian Hou share fifth at 4-under.
A total of 66 players made the cut 2-over, including 2022 champions Gina Kim, Kiira Riihijarvi, Ssu-Chia Cheng, Linnea Strom and Grace Kim.
QUICK QUOTES
Kristin Coleman (+2, T53) on her hole-in-one:
“I just hit a smooth cut 7-iron and it went pretty straight. It kicked off the rough bank and went in. It was exciting, I hit a couple of not great shots on the opening holes, so it was nice to get a little bounce back and get back to cruising.”
Maddi Caldwell-Young (-1, T27) on her eagle on No. 7:
“It felt great. I’ve had a couple of chances in the last couple weeks, and I just haven’t made them. It felt good to hit it close and get it in the hole.”
Gina Kim (-3, T10) on jumping from T49 to T10:
“Obviously the first round was a bit tough, and the putts weren’t falling in, but I reminded myself to stay patient and it paid off today. I’ve been in these situations before, so I’m very comfortable with where I’m at and I look forward to another round of good golf.”
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