WEST CALDWELL, N.J — The second round of the Mizuho Americas Open was met with blustery and cold conditions that made it feel more like November out on the course than early May.
The weather, combined with a difficult course at Mountain Ridge, made it feel more like a Monday working, than a Friday playing golf. Many in the field were multiple shots higher than in Round 1 and struggled to stay consistent amid the spitting, chilly day.
When the first group finished 18, they hustled quickly into the clubhouse for scoring, in a hurry to escape the unseasonable elements, as well as the final hole that’s playing nearly a stroke over par.
Celine Boutier, however, was first out Friday and finished the day with a 4-under 68. She currently sits in fourth place on the leaderboard, five back of leader Jeeno Thitikul, and said the unseasonable weather made the round challenging.
“It was quite chilly this morning when we got out on the course. And then the wind started picking up when I was halfway through the front nine and it’s just been blowing quite hard the last hour or two,” said Boutier, who is at 3 under after 36 holes.
Thitikul, the world No. 2, played in the afternoon wave and shot 69 to reach 8 under. “The weather is so weird,” she said succinctly.
Out early, Jennifer Kupcho held the clubhouse lead before dropping to solo second. She birdied four holes on the front nine and had one birdie and two bogeys on the back half for a 69 to reach 5 under. She said she was able to take a lot more chances and be more aggressive before conditions worsened in the afternoon.
“Come the back nine when it was windy, as it is right now, I think you kind of have to be a little bit careful not to putt to, say, 10 feet by or more or even off the green. The greens are really fast, so you just have to think about it and just be careful about what you’re doing,” Kupcho said after her round.
Though Kupcho sported multiple layers on Friday, she said she’s used to this kind of weather. “I’m from Colorado, so I’m used to the cold,” she quipped. “I mean, it’s not bad until the wind picks up. Kind of once you get to the bottom of the hill it doesn’t hit you as hard down there. Definitely up here at the top and when we’re finishing, yeah, it gets cold the last couple holes.”
When world No. 5 Hannah Green finished her round with Lydia Ko and Charley Hull at 1-over 73, the Aussie remarked on the difficulty of the conditions.
“It became really swirly out there,” Green said. “There is just a couple pin locations on some really tricky greens that are going to be really hard to manage this afternoon, so, yeah, I’m kind of glad that I’ll be having lunch very soon.”
Hull missed the cut and Ko shot 8 strokes higher than Thursday (75). The LPGA Hall of Famer, who is six off the pace, agreed that the wind played a huge factor. “I think putting actually becomes one of the hardest parts because the ball is oscillating and you’re trying to stay calm and not move all around the place. You just have to be patient,” Ko said.
The weather isn’t the only thing making Mizuho a challenge, it’s the difficulty of the pristine, yet hilly, course itself, which many players have equated to major-level links this week. “I think this golf course, it definitely has major feelings to it out here just because it plays long, tough, the wind will play a huge factor,” Megan Khang, who sits at even par after rounds of 71-73, said earlier in the week.
Ko summed up the tournament so far quite well: “It’s almost like a British Open, but at a U.S. Open setup.”
In anticipation of potential inclement weather Saturday, tee times will be moved up and coverage can be seen from 12:30-3:30 p.m. on CNBC (and streaming on GolfChannel.com).
