(30 May 2011 – Nagaoka, Niigata Prefecture, Japan)
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34-year-old Hiromi Mogi collected her fifth overall career title with a come-from-behind victory at the Yonex Ladies on Sunday. It took a final hole birdie by Mogi to edge out overnight leader, Korea&aposs Ji Hee Lee by one shot in a tightly fought contest. Ayako Uehara of Japan and So-Hee Kim of Korea finished a further shot back in a tie for third.
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The final round began with 15 players within four shots of Lee who sat on 5-under par, and in a tournament where there were only 15 rounds in the 60’s, pars were going to be at a premium and birdies a bonus on a tense final day. And that’s the way it turned out with only one player in the top-15 making the turn under par for the day. This bunched the field even more with the leader, Lee, making the turn at 3-under par.
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It was a case of who could take their chances on the back nine which Mogi did with birdies at the 11th and 15th holes, the birdie at 15 seeing her join Lee at the top of the leaderboard. She was to hold that spot on her own shortly thereafter when Lee made a costly bogey at the 16th hole. Mogi, playing a group in front of Lee rammed home the advantage when she nailed her birdie putt on the 18th to move to 5-under par. This meant that Lee required birdies at the final two holes to force a playoff. Unfortunately for her, she could only manage one at the 17th but could only manage a par at the last hole and the victory was Mogi’s.
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It was the veteran’s first title in three years and the fifth in her nine year career on the premier Japanese tour. She moves up to 4th on the 2011 Money List with ¥21,772,000 (approx. AUD$251,473) in season earnings.
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Tamie Durdin was the only Australian playing this week and unfortunately missed the cut after rounds of 74 and 78.
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