Ford co-leaders Nelly Korda and Jeeno Thitikul like playing fast on a fast golf course
The weather was a little cooler but the track was still running fast at the second round of the 2025 Ford Championship.
Charley Hull’s first-round 9-under 63 highlighted the day on March 27. She posted that number during a more favorable morning wave, with the average score in the afternoon almost a stroke higher.
Nelly Korda and Jeeno Thitikul bucked the late wave trend, however, with a 5-under 67 and a 4-under 68, respectively. Playing in a group with Patty Tavatanakit the first two days, Korda and Thitikul went low again Friday morning. Korda shot 7-under 65 while Thitikul was one better with an 8-under 64. That tied them at 12 under atop the leaderboard when they signed their scorecards, and they’re bidding to be paired once again for Saturday’s third round.
Opening birdie-birdie-eagle-birdie, Thitikul made the turn (she started on the 10th tee) in 29 but slowed a bit coming home. Still, she’s a clubhouse co-leader and might be teeing it up again with a player she likes to play with.
“Definitely. She’s the No. 1 in the world, and one fact that is good is she’s fast playing, which is good,” Thitikul said. “She’s always playing good, and then also like it’s just keep me, like keep motivating me to play some good golf as well.”
Korda had a stretch of four birdies over six holes on March 28 and scored two shots better than on March 27. She, too, says she likes playing with Thitikul and Tavatanakit.
“Yeah, it was great. I think Patty actually said on the last hole, she was like, ‘I love this group,'” Korda said. “It was like a great tempo. We kept our rhythm really nicely. When everyone is playing nicely you kind of feed off each other as well.”
This being the first LPGA event using the new pace-of-play rules, this was one threesome that was never going to be put on the clock.
This article originally appeared on Golfweek: Ford Championship: Nelly Korda, Jeeno Thitikul play fast on fast course
