Written by: Khushi Gupta

Gainbridge LPGA is held at Boca Rio, Florida. It is a women’s professional golf tournament on the LPGA Tour. Having sponsored its previous tournaments of 2017, 2018, and 2019 at the Indianopolis Motor Speedway, it was eventually moved to Florida in 2020 after which, the tournament is always played there, now for the third year in Boca Raton at Boca Rio Golf Club.

The tournament held this year in 2022 started on the 27th of January and is to end on the 30th of the same month. The competition in the tournament is tough as the course is not flooded by star players such as the Korda sisters, Danielle Kang, and many others. The prize purse of this tournament is higher than the prize purse that was for the Tournament of Champions that was held just last week. This time the prize purse goes up to $2 million. The winner will be receiving a cut of 15 percent from the total of the prize purse as is listed in the LPGA Tour’s prize money distribution chart. This will be adding up to a total of $300,000 for the winner of the tournament. Apart from the prize money, there are many more incentives that the winner of the tournament will be bestowed with which includes 500 Race to the CME Globe points with a two-year exemption on the LPGA Tour and also a place in the noticeable tournaments of the season. With a total of 120 players competing in a cutthroat competition, from among all of them, only the top 70 including all the ties will be making it to the weekend.

Aditi Ashok

The 1st round of the tournament was held on the 27th of January where Lydia Ko of New Zealand made it to the top of the leaderboard with birdies on most of the holes including 1, 2, 3, 6, 8, 10, 13, 14, and 15. Aditi Ashok on the other hand was just 3 shots below the topmost Lydia who headed the first round.

"Last time [here at Boca Rio] I missed the cut, but I remember it being long. This time I was kind of focused on playing the long holes well and worked on my hybrids a lot the last three, four days," Aditi said. "That helped because I know I'm going to get at least five or six hybrids, maybe more, into greens. Being able to hit those close and make birdies with hybrids was good for me. I made, I think, three or four birdies today with a 5-hybrid [approach], which is great for me. Wish I would've added it sooner in my career, but better late than never," Aditi added.

The second round of the tournament being held on the 28th of January too went extremely well. Lydia Ko who held the first position in the first round was accompanied by Danielle Kang of the USA for a tie on the first position. With birdies in holes 5 and 8, Aditi placed for a tie on the fifth position with the others. With Aditi doing extremely well, Nishtha too tried to give in her best in this debut. Though she was able to make the cut in the first round of the Gainbridge LPGA, she could not make the same in the second round which took her way down but in the future would play a better game.

Lydia Ko - The Winner of the Tournament

The end of the tournament was extremely enticing. As was expected, Lydia Ko continued to play well throughout the tournament, keeping herself at the top of the leaderboard with birdies on holes 1, 11, 15, and 16 in the last round par fourteen-under 274 claiming the trophy of the tournament with the title of the winner in the end. “Going into today, I knew that it was going to be pretty difficult,” Lydia said. “Playing in the wind, any sort of temperature, makes it a lot tougher, and I knew that today was going to be a little bit more of a grind. You have to be more focused and move on when you do make mistakes. But I think I made a few good par saves on the back nine, which was even more important than making birdies at times. Finishing with pars the last couple holes, I got away with it there. To finish even par after a tough day, I think it was a solid day in the office.”

Aditi on the other hand too played well. Being among the top 5 in the previous rounds, she tried to keep up her score in the last round as well but was pulled down a bit to a tie for the 13th place by the end of it all owing to less birdies and a bogey on the 13th hole with birdies on holes 1, 4, and 14. All in all, the end of all the rounds left her feeling satisfied with her game.