At the end of the morning wave there is a three-way tie for first at the Evian Championship, with Leona Maguire, Andrea Lee and Gabi Ruffels shooting -6 65.
Maguire made bogey on the first hole, but was mostly flawless otherwise. She made four birdies on the front nine to get to 3, then had the shot of the day so far on her 11th hole of the day, the par 3 second. Maguire made a hole in one on the downhill hole that players have been attacking all day. She finished with one last birdie on her 16th hole of the day.
As is usually the case with Maguire, she didn’t over power the course, but she did hit 11/13 fairways and 15 greens.
Andrea Lee came charging late in her round. After shooting -3 on the front with four birdies and one bogey, she made birdies on three of her last four holes, moving her rapidly up the leaderboard. Lee is coming off a solid performance at the Dow Championship and is in strong form over the last couple of months.
Gabi Ruffels, still looking for her first LPGA Tour victory, got off to a quick start with five birdies on her first 10 holes with no bogeys on the scorecard for the day. Ruffels had one more birdie coming in, on her 16th hole of the day.
Ruffels’ round in particular was impressive considering she hit just eight fairways. In the early stages of this event, the rough has been quite the punishment. It is thick and producing some brutal lies and it has proven to be difficult to hold the greens out of even the lightest rough.
Lurking just one stroke back is the most recent major champion, Minjee Lee, who shot -5 in the opening round. Lee once again was fantastic on the greens, needing just 25 strokes with the flat stick to get around the course.
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