{"id":14272,"date":"2025-10-31T16:34:02","date_gmt":"2025-10-31T14:34:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jhb-webdevelopers\/channelafrica\/news\/hye-jin-choi-builds-5-shot-lead-at-maybank-championship\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T16:26:53","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T14:26:53","slug":"hye-jin-choi-builds-5-shot-lead-at-maybank-championship","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/hye-jin-choi-builds-5-shot-lead-at-maybank-championship\/","title":{"rendered":"Hye-Jin Choi builds 5-shot lead at Maybank Championship"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Choi bogeyed the first hole before recording seven birdies over the final 17on Friday to reside at 14-under 130 at the Kuala Lumpur Golf and Country Club course.<\/div>\n
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The 26-year-old South Korean is vying for her first win on the LPGA Tour, although she secured a second-place finish at the 2017 United States Women’s Open as a17-year-old amateur.<\/div>\n
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“So from the start I made a bogey on the first hole, but I tried to keep the faith and play steady,” Choi said. “So I made lots of birdies today and my shots and putting was all good.”<\/div>\n
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Defending champion Ruoning Yin of China moved into a tie for second after shooting a 67 on Friday. Yin, who rolled off four consecutive birdies on holes Nos. 3-6 and added three more against two bogeys, is tied with Australian Hannah Green (69).<\/div>\n
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“I feel like every part of my game is getting better every day, especially my putting,” Yin said. “I said it in the press conference, I think my putting is the only thing that is not quite at the spot. But I feel really good after two days.”<\/div>\n
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Green, who won the BMW Ladies Championship last year in Paju, South Korea, said she feels comfortable playing in a place closer to home than many LPGA destinations.<\/div>\n
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“Yeah, I really enjoy coming to Asia,” Green said. “The food can be difficult sometimes. I must admit I’m not good with spice so I don’t really do much Malaysian food. I just really enjoy when we come here.<\/div>\n
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“I think having the same time zone makes it helpful to be able to communicate with those back at home. I know these weeks can be some of the longest weeks of the year, so making sure I don’t get too ahead of myself and take it easy and rest a little bit more than probably usual.”<\/div>\n
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New Zealand’s Lydia Ko (70) is part of an eight-golfer contingent tied for fourth place at 8-under. World No. 1 Jeeno Thitikul (70) finds herself in a tie for 18th place at6-under. This is the third edition of this no-cut event, which was first won by Frenchwoman Celine Boutier on the ninth hole of a playoff against Thitikul in 2023. Yin set the tournament record of 23-under with her one-shot victory last year against Thitikul.<\/div>\n
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–Reuters–<\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":14273,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[20],"class_list":["post-14272","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-sport","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Hye-Jin Choi carded a 6-under-par 66 on Friday to extend her lead to five strokes following the second round of the Maybank Championship in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia","published_date":"2025-10-31 00:00:00","news_description":"Hye-Jin Choi carded a 6-under-par 66 on Friday to extend her lead to five strokes following the second round of the Maybank Championship in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/14272","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/14272\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19006,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/14272\/revisions\/19006"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14273"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14272"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=14272"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}