There's frost on the pumpkins at this time of year, Canadian snowbirds are flocking to their time shares in Florida and more and more to Arizona, and the PGA and LPGA tours have moved their dolls and dishes to Korea, Japan and China, the European Tour is in France this week, before joining them.
Brooke Henderson is off to a great start leading the Buick LPGA Shanghai, story below.
There are more and more Americans making the trip, lucrative WGC events in China for the top 60, a new event to promote in Japan and the emergence of the Korean domination in the women's game as golf becomes world wide are some of the reasons.
It's a welcome change of attitude. World #1 Brooks Koepka honed his game on the Challenge and European Tours, not many or any Americans before him did that unless they couldn't make it on the PGA Tour.
In days of yore Sam Snead refused to travel because the expense was more than he could win at the Open ! Hale Irwin who still has won more tournaments than anyone on the Senior Circuit declined to play in the Open saying "I don't want to mess up my swing in all that wind over there"
Next week, two kingpins of the game, Tiger and Rory are playing an exhibition match in Japan before the tournament which will be wildly received.
European Tour French Open leaderboard https://www.europeantour.com/european-tour/amundi-open-de-france-2019/leaderboard
An Asian American who plays on the European Tour, 5'5" Kurt Kitayama holds the clubhouse lead at -8 with round 2 well underway on Le National, site of last years triumphant European Tour win at the Ryder Cup. He is another example of a world traveller, winning earlier in the year in Mauritius.
PGA Tour CJ Cup @ Nine Bridges leaderboard https://www.pgatour.com/competition/2020/the-cj-cup-at-nine-bridges/leaderboard.html
Another American who has embraced travelling, Justin Thomas leads this CJ Cup in golf mad South Korea, at the beautiful resort on Jeju-do island . The 2017 champion shot a -9 63 to lead by two shots at -13 after two rounds.
A resurgent Jordan Spieth who lost 20 pounds with a bout of mononucleosis shot -7 65 and iS T4 -9.
LPGA Tour Buick LPGA Shanghai https://www.lpga.com/leaderboard
On the strength of a hole-in-one at No. 2, Brooke Henderson tied the tournament scoring record with a second round 64 and pushed to the top of the leaderboard at -11 heading to the weekend at the Buick LPGA Shanghai.
She aced the second hole, from 144 yards with an 9-iron.
“I didn't see it at all, and then Olly (Brett), one of the caddies in our group (for Danielle Kang), turned and said, that went in,’” said Henderson, who added it was her seventh career hole-in-one. “We were like "What, really!" That was pretty cool. It definitely got my day started in the right direction.”
Having opened with a -3 69, Henderson cruised around Qizhong Garden Golf Club on Friday, tying her low round of the season thanks to that ace, seven birdies and just one bogey.
“I really like this golf course. I feel like it does suit my game really well. You really have to stay patient and pay attention to the wind conditions. It's important to hit a lot of fairways and the greens are so large that you're going to hit a lot of greens, but the proximity to the hole is really important.”
Alena Sharp 72 72, E T29
Americans Jessica Korda and Danielle Kang both shot 5-under 67s on Friday to sit second at -9 and third at -8, respectively, and join Henderson in Saturday’s final group.
Bryan Angus
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