Two of the LPGA Tour’s biggest stars, Nelly Korda and Minjee Lee, recovered from nightmare starts in the second round of the Evian Championship to stay in contention heading into the weekend.
Korda went off on the back nine in the morning wave and hit struggles immediately. After a pair of pars on 10 and 11, Korda dropped strokes on 12 and 13. After a couple pars on 14 and 15, she had a double bogey on the par 3 16, dropping her to even par for the tournament, +4 for the day.
Korda’s round completely turned around though on the reachable par 5 18, where she made a clutch eagle to get back to -2 for the week. After the turn, Korda made three more birdies without dropping a stroke including on her closing hole.
Once again, Korda was a bit erratic off the tee. For the week so far she has hit only 13/26 fairways. If her driver can be worked out, she could erase the five stroke lead in a hurry on a course where the par 5s are scoreable.
Minjee Lee ran into troubles as well early after shooting -5 on Thursday. Lee bogeyed her first three holes and added a double on hole six to put her five over for the day and even for the tournament. Lee’s putter, which has been in terrific shape this season, hit a bit of a road block early.
Lee did recover well thanks to birdies on the two par 5s on the front side, holes seven and nine. She added two more birdies quick on 11 and 13. Despite dropping a shot on the difficult par 3 14, which was playing borderline unfair today, she came back with birdies on the final two holes to close out her round at -5.
Lee and Korda both sit at -5, just inside striking range of Somi Lee’s -10 number. These two have more experience than anyone on the leaderboard winning majors though. They are the only two within the top 25 with multiple major championships to their name already.
