Charley Hull, Pia Babnik and Luna Sobron share the clubhouse lead at the final tournament of the Aramco Team Series in Riyadh.
Charley Hull
According to the Saudi Press Agency (SPA), the English Charley Hull has rocked the first round with a strong start to end her two-year worldwide winless run by capturing a share of Riyadh’s lead.
Currently, Hull is pursuing her first worldwide victory since the Volunteers of America Classic on the LPGA Tour in October 2022.
Interestingly, the English star has achieved a thriving opening day with a seven-under 65 in the final tournament at Riyadh Golf Club.
“It’s a very, very scoreable golf course. You could shoot 60 – I was looking to shoot a 58 after the front nine – but yeah, I played well,” Hull reflected.
Consequently, she carded an eagle and six birdies temporarily taking her to eight-under-par.
However, she lost the outright advantage through a bogey on her final hole of the day.
“It was a shame about my putt on the last, it just bobbled. It went straight down like a line on the green, but I played pretty decent,” she added.
Pia Babnik
Slovenian Pia Babnik, winner of the Aramco Team Series presented by PIF in Jeddah in 2021, also shares the lead at seven-under-par.
In 2022, Babnik ranked 67th in the world with remarkable progress and impressive performance.
However, she suffered low performance which dropped her to 512th.
Fortunately, Charley Hull has introduced Babnik to a new coach, Matt Belsham, who has helped Babnik to rebuild both her confidence and her technique.
“I’ve been working with him since last August. It’s just been amazing. He helped me a lot. I still have my dad as a coach, but it’s just good to have Matt. He completely changed my swing to be more compact and, yeah, just more stable. My technique was just terrible, so we’re still working on that, and then the power will come back as soon as I get the feel of the new technique,” Babnik stated.
Luna Sobron
Also at the top of the leaderboard early in the day was Spaniard Luna Sobron after finishing the day at seven-under-par.
This achievement represents a welcome return to form after she lost her LPGA tour card and suffered battling injuries.
“It’s a really good course. I only had nine holes of practice on Tuesday and nine on Wednesday, but you can really score low with the right shots. My putting was on fire, I made nearly all of them. I have changed up my putter, and now I’m using aimpoint – so I feel like everything has become much clearer to me,” Sobron reflected.
Cassandra Alexander
The opening day also witnessed a hole-in-one with South Africa’s Cassandra Alexander walking off with an ace on the sixth hole, a 165-yard par-three.
Unfortunately, Alexander has missed this magical moment after some debate with her caddie on what club to use.
“I didn’t see it!” she admitted. “It was Anabel Fuller’s mum who told me, and I was like, ok cool! My caddie had a nine iron in mind, but I thought a chippy eight would be good… and chippy eight it was. I missed a few putts, if I could have made one or two more, I would have been even happier, but three under for the day, I’ll take it,” she said.
Chiara Tamburlini
As for the team competitions, the Ladies European Tour’s rising star Chiara Tamburlini led her team to equal the record of 23-under-par. It serves as a single day scoring record for the series.
After winning the team event in Shenzhen, Tamburlini looks forward to becoming the first ever captain to win successive titles.
Her group consists of Anne-Charlotte Mora, Mimi Rhodes and amateur Teniel Chu – who contributed with an incredible 11 net birdies to the team score.
“We had a great team again, and we all played well,” said Tamburlini. “But to be top again, it just shows as well how much I love this format and how well it suits my game and my mental game especially. Hopefully we’ll get it done tomorrow,” Tamburlini added.
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