Eun-Hee Ji shoots 64 to early lead in Lotte Championship

KAPOLEI, Hawaii – Eun-Hee Ji birdied six of the final eight holes for an 8-under 64 and a two-shot lead Wednesday halfway through the first round of the Lotte Championship.

Ji won the season-opening Diamond Resorts Tournament of Champions for her fifth LPGA Tour victory. The 2009 U.S. Women’s Open champion had a bogey-free round at Ko Olina Golf Club.

Fellow South Korean player So Yeon Ryu and Australia’s Hannah Green were tied for second. Ryu is ranked ninth in the world, while Green was an LPGA rookie last year after winning three times on the 2017 Symetra Tour.

Defending champion Brooke Henderson, Hawaii’s Michelle Wie – the 2014 champion – and new No. 1 Jin Young Ko after her victory two weeks ago in the ANA Inspiration – played in the afternoon.

Minjee Lee, the 2016 Lotte winner now ranked fourth in the world, was at 67 with Danielle Kang, Moriya Jutanugarn and rookies Suzuka Yamaguchi and Lilia Vu. Sei Young Kim, the 2015 winner in a playoff, birdied eight of the first 12 holes, then dropped back with a bogey on the par-3 16th and a double bogey in the par-4 18th. She finished with a 68.

Kim Kaufman had a hole-in-one on the fourth hole – the first of her six-year LPGA career. She shot 71.