Stephanie Meadow has hit the ground running in her early-season efforts on the LPGA Tour, the 28-year-old Northern Irishwoman following up her strong showing in last month’s Gainbridge tournament in Florida with an impressive opening round five-under-par 67 in the ISPS Handa Vic Open in Australia to lie just three strokes off the leaders.
For good measure, tour rookie Leona Maguire – who narrowly missed the cut in Florida – also produced a solid start with a 69 on the same Creek Course at host venue 13th Beach Golf Links resort.
In the unique event, with both women and men’s tournaments played simultaneously on the two courses on the Bellarine Peninsula in Victoria, Sweden’s Madelele Sagstrom and South Korea’s Haeji Kang shared the first round lead with 65s in a tournament that is co-sanctioned by the LPGA Tour while Spain’s Alejandro Canizarez fired a fine opening round 63 to assume outright leadership in the men’s event which is co-sanctioned by the European Tour.
Meadow, who opened her season with a tied-35th finish in the Gainbridge, brought her game on to Australia where an impressive bogey-free round – featuring five birdies, at the first, third, eighth, 15th and 18th – moved her into a share of 15th place. Meadow retained her full LPGA Tour last season with a tied-sixth finish in the Volunteer of America Classic which got her into the top-100 on the order of merit.
Maguire, who graduated from the Symetra Tour last season to earn a full tour card, had a rather more adventurous round with six birdies and three bogeys to lie in tied-28th after the first round.
Sagstrom followed up her win in the Gainbridge with another excellent round – with birdies at five of her first seven holes – for a 65 to claim a share of the lead. “I think currently I’m really working hard on my patience,” said the Swede, who made her Solheim Cup debut in 2017.
She added: “I think after my first win there’s definitely added confidence to everything, just knowing I can compete out here, knowing that I can win on tour . . . . it’s also created a little bit of calmness, just, ‘okay, it’s going to be fine, it will all work out’.”
In the men’s tournament, Canizares claimed a two stroke first round lead over a quartet of four Australian players while Jonathan Caldwell, who earned his tour card at Q-School last November, opened with a five-under-par 67 to lie in tied-14th.
A Walker Cup team-mate of Rory McIlroy at Royal County Down in 2007, Caldwell has taken some time to find his feet on the main stage but the 35-year-old was the epitome of consistency in a bogey-free round of 67 that featured a run of three birdies in four holes from the 15th.
Cormac Sharvin, who earned his European Tour card off the Challenge Tour last season, opened with a 70 - four birdies and two bogeys - and had work to do to survive the 36-holes cut.
WOMEN’S LEADERBOARD
USA unless stated, par 72, (a) denotes amateurs
Beach Course
65 Pei-yun Chien (Chn)
67 Stephanie Meadow (N Irl)
68 Ally McDonald, Jeongeun Lee (Kor)
69 (a) Jiwon Jeon (Kor), Jasmine Suwannapura (Tha), Hye Jin Choi (Kor), Cristie Kerr, Minjee Lee (Aus), Hannah Green (Aus), Daniela Holmqvist (Swe), Leona Maguire (Irl), Paige Stubbs (Aus)
70 Linnea Johansson (Swe), (a) Alana Uriell, Hee Jung Lim (Kor), Robyn Choi (Aus), Inbee Park (Kor), Karine Icher (Fra), Suzuka Yamaguchi (Jpn), Tiffany Chan (Hkg), Yu Liu (Chn), Sarah Schmelzel, Lauren Stephenson
71 Yealimi Noh, Diksha Dagar (Ind), So Yeon Ryu (Kor), Min Seo Kwak (Kor), (a) Min A Yoon (Kor), Anne Van Dam (Ned), Charlotte Heath (Eng), Kim Kaufman
72 Manon De Roey (Bel), Melissa Reid (Eng), Celine Boutier (Fra), Jennifer Coleman, Maria Fassi (Mex), Maria Torres (Pue), Mariah Stackhouse, Munchin Keh (Nzl)
73 Emma Talley, Karis Davidson (Aus), Lindy Duncan, Su Oh (Aus), Jiyai Shin (Kor), Kylie Henry (Sco), Sarah Burnham, Lindsey Weaver, Hee-won Jung (Kor)
74 (a) Yuka Saso (Phl), Pajaree Anannarukarn (Tha), (a) Andrea Lee, Beatriz Recari (Esp), Giulia Molinaro (Ita), Katja Pogacar (Slo)
75 Jennifer Song, Sakura Yokomine (Jpn), Ryann O'Toole, Hana Lee (Kor)
76 Grace Kim (Aus), Ayako Uehara (Jpn), Breanna Gill (Aus)
77 Sarah-Jane Smith (Aus), Whitney Hillier (Aus)
78 Brianna Do, Ling-Jie Chen (Chn)
79 Mind Muangkhumsakul (Tha), Pernilla Lindberg (Swe), Elizabeth Nagel
80 Patty Tavatanakit (Tha)
81 Katherine Perry, Christine Wolf
Creek Course
65 Madelene Sagstrom (Swe), Haeji Kang (Kor)
66 Haley Moore, Linnea Strom (Swe)
67 Dana Finkelstein, Tiffany Joh, Christina Kim, Xi Yu Lin (Chn), Pornanong Phatlum (Tha), Cheyenne Knight, Laura Davies (Eng), Pavarisa Yoktuan (Tha), Klara Spilkova (Cze)
68 Cydney Clanton, Stephanie Kyriacou (Aus), Matilda Castren, Pei-ying Tsai (Tai), Alena Sharp (Can), Hee Young Park (Kor)
69 Perrine Delacour (Fra), A-yean Cho (Kor), Jin Hee Imn (Kor), Mina Harigae
70 Dottie Ardina (Phl), (a) Ho-Yu An (Tpe), (a) Albane Valenzuela (Swi), Julieta Granada (Pry)
71 Jeong Eun Lee (Kor), Ssu-Chia Cheng (Chn), Amy Olson, Caroline Hedwall (Swe), Na Yeon Choi (Kor), Austin Ernst, Wei-Ling Hsu (Tai), (a) Jennifer Chang, Sarah Kemp (Aus)
72 Esther Lee (Kor), Elizabeth Szokol, Esther Henseleit (Ger), (a) Hira Naveed (Aus), Robynn Ree, Jane Park, Katherine Kirk (Aus), Gemma Dryburgh (Sco), Stephanie Na (Aus), Wichanee Meechai (Tha), Kelly Tan (Mal)
73 Cheyenne Woods, Yui Kawamoto (Jpn), Hanee Song (Nzl), Jing Yan (Chn)
74 Maia Schechter, Tonje Daffinrud (Nor), Charlotte Thomas (Eng), Marianne Skarpnord (Nor), Lauren Kim, Stacy Lewis, Daniela Darquea (Ecu)
75 Louise Ridderstrom (Swe), Meghan MacLaren (Eng), Karrie Webb (Aus), Jillian Hollis
76 Mariajo Uribe (Col), Marissa Steen, Haru Nomura (Jpn), Ashleigh Buhai (Rsa), Soo Jin Lee (Aus)
77 Elmay Viking (Aus)
78 Felicity Johnson (Eng), Ayaka Sugihara (Jpn), Tahnia Ravnjak (Aus), Peng-Shan Liu (Chn)
MEN’S LEADERBOARD
British and Irish unless stated, par 72, (a) denotes amateurs
Beach Course
65 Justin Warren (Aus)
66 Zach Murray (Aus), Andrew Martin (Aus), Jed Morgan (Aus), Aaron Cockerill (Can), Robin Sciot-Siegrist (Fra)
67 Geoff Ogilvy (Aus), Nick Flanagan (Aus), Shae Wools-Cobb (Aus), Wil Besseling (Ned), Derek Ackerman (USA), Jarryd Felton (Aus), Jonathan Caldwell, Sean Crocker (USA), Ashley Hall (Aus)
68 Ben Eccles (Aus), Hugo Leon (Chi), David Smail (Nzl), Blake Collyer (Aus), Scott Arnold (Aus), Taylor MacDonald (Aus), Lars Van Meijel (Ned)
69 Aaron Townsend (Aus), Robbie Morrison, Andre Lautee (a) (Aus), Kyle Michel (Aus), Rikard Karlberg (Swe), Haotong Li (Chn), Sami Valimaki (Fin), Peter Fowler (Aus), Dimitrios Papadatos (Aus)
70 Niklas Lemke (Swe), Daniel Fox (Aus), Denzel Ieremia (Nzl), Brett Rumford (Aus), Lucas Herbert (Aus), Sam Horsfield, Richard Green (Aus), Dave Coupland, Yu-Cheng Hsu (Tai), Cory Crawford (Aus), Marcus Fraser (Aus)
71 Jason Norris (Aus), Charlie Dann (Aus), Matt Jager (Aus), Garrick Porteous
72 Matthew Millar (Aus), Kade McBride (Aus), Yung-Hua Liu (Tai), Dale Brandt-Richards (Aus), Alex Simpson (Aus), Cameron John (Aus), Dale Williamson (Aus), Dale Whitnell, Ryan Chisnall (Nzl), Suradit Yongcharoenchai (Tha), Peter O'Malley (Aus)
73 Blake Proverbs (Aus), Anthony Marchesani (Aus)
74 Ryan Woodward (Aus), David Micheluzzi (Aus), Josh Clarke (Aus), Jay MacKenzie (Aus)
75 Anthony Quayle (Aus), Andrew Schonewillie (Aus)
76 John Lyras (Aus), Aaron Pike (Aus)
77 Josh Armstrong (Aus), Joel Sjoholm (Swe), Dylan Perry (Aus)
78 Lloyd Radcliffe (Aus)
82 Luke Brown (Rsa)
Creek Course
63 Alejandro Canizares (Esp)
65 Jake McLeod (Aus), Matthew Griffin (Aus), Travis Smyth (Aus)
66 Andrew Evans (Aus), Brad Kennedy (Aus), Min Woo Lee (Aus)
67 Gareth Paddison (Nzl), Matthew Stieger (Aus), Michael Hendry (Nzl), Ryan Fox (Nzl), Simon Hawkes (Aus), Steven Jeffress (Aus), Peter Wilson (Aus)
68 David Law, Terry Pilkadaris (Aus), Sebastian Garcia Rodriguez (Esp), Benjamin Poke (Den), Nick Cullen (Aus), Jason Scrivener (Aus), Josh Younger (Aus), Daniel Hillier (Nzl), Ryan McCarthy (Aus), Chang Gib Lee (Kor)
69 Michael Sim (Aus), Jordan Zunic (Aus), Darren Beck (Aus), Brady Watt (Aus), Ashley Chesters, Peter Lonard (Aus), Lincoln Tighe (Aus), Blake Windred (a) (Aus), James Anstiss (Aus), Kevin Yuan (Aus), Martin Dive (Aus)
70 Cormac Sharvin, Quinton Howe (Aus), Andrew Dodt (Aus), Brett Rankin (Aus), Nick O'Hern (Aus), Taylor Gill (Aus), Stephen Allan (Aus), Hideto Tanihara (Jpn), James Marchesani (USA), Louis Dobbelar (Aus), David Bransdon (Aus), John Catlin (USA)
71 Tom Power Horan (Aus), Daniel Nisbet (Aus), James Grierson (Aus), Darius Van Driel (Ned), Wade Ormsby (Aus), Luke Toomey (Aus)
72 Matthew Jordan, Daniel Gale (Aus), Matt Dowling (Aus), Connor Syme, Max McCardle (Aus), Ching-Hung Su (Tai), Robert Hogan (Aus)
73 Janne Kaske (Fin), Maverick Antcliff (Aus), Callan O'Reilly (Aus), Peter Cooke (Aus)
74 Campbell Rawson (Aus), Rick Kulacz (Aus), Linus Yip (Aus), Hyunsik Kong (Aus)
75 Louis De Jager (Rsa), Harry Bateman (Nzl), Josh Geary (Nzl)
76 Yi-Keun Chang (Kor)
