EVIAN-LES-BAINS, France — Grace Kim delivered one gorgeous shot after one other Sunday within the Evian Championship, beginning with an eagle to pressure a playoff and one other eagle to beat Jeeno Thitikul on the second further gap to make her first LPGA win a serious title.
Kim, whose 2-foot eagle putt on the par-5 18th in regulation gave her a 4-under 67, gave the impression to be simply as shocked as everybody else when she rolled in a 12-foot eagle putt to win the playoff. The 24-year-old Australian calmly positioned her hand over her mouth and stood nonetheless earlier than doubling over and breaking into a large smile.
Thitikul’s largest problem had been English beginner Lottie Woad, who was coming off a win within the Irish Ladies’s Open and at one level had the lead on the again 9 of Evian Resort. She closed with a 64 after which waited to see if that will be sufficient.
Woad was bidding to turn into the primary beginner to win a serious since Catherine Lacoste on the 1967 U.S. Ladies’s Open.
Thitikul birdied the seventeenth to take the lead, and the Thai participant was on the verge of her first main when she laid up in need of the pond and hit wedge into 8 ft on the ultimate gap.
However there was Kim, blasting a fairway steel onto the inexperienced. The ball rolled again down the slope to 2 ft for eagle to tie for the lead. Thitikul’s birdie putt for the title missed proper. She shot 67 and joined Kim at 14-under 270, one forward of Woad and Minjee Lee (68).
Again to the 18th within the playoff, Thitikul once more seemed like a winner when Kim’s second shot bounced on a cart path, over some rocks and into the pond. Thitikul was simply left of the inexperienced in two. Kim took her penalty drop, then chipped in for birdie throughout the inexperienced.
Thitikul needed to make an 8-foot birdie putt to increase the playoff, which she did. Taking part in the 18th for the third time, Kim once more delivered one other magnificence over the pond and onto the inexperienced to about 12 ft.
Thitikul, who had tiny bugs buzzing round her ball within the collar of a bunker, chipped weakly to about 6 ft. She may solely watch as Kim ended it with an eagle.
That prolonged what already is a document streak within the LPGA Tour’s 75-year historical past, the 18th consecutive match to start out a season with a special winner. It additionally makes 13 completely different winners within the final 13 majors.
Kim received for the second time on the LPGA, including to her title in Hawaii two years in the past.