Min Woo Lee produces day’s best 65 to share 6th place in Los Angeles
Min Woo Lee during today’s second round – image USGA
Min Woo Lee has made an outstanding move on day two of the 123rd US Open, his second round of 65 the best of the day and sweeping the into a share of 6th place and now just four shots from the halfway leader, Rickie Fowler.
Lee, playing in the relatively early morning conditions on day two, book-ended his round with birdies but in between there were four other birdies and a lone bogey at the 5th hole where he found trouble form the teen and could only advance to ball 65 yards and was left with a pitch from 115 yards to attempt a par save. It was not to be but he is nicely placed heading to the weekend of just his second US Open.
“Everything is working pretty good,” said the 24 year old from Perth. “My approach play has been pretty lacking over the last year or my whole career, so it’s quite nice to actually be in the positives I think the last two days.
“Hitting it well, driving it well, driving it a long way actually, which is nice on this course because it’s long. Just not making too many mistakes. When I do hit it in the rough, I need to take my medicine and just hit it out.”
When asked, Lee would say; “I really don’t know why I decide to play well in the majors and not other tournaments. Yeah, I think it’s a good thing. I don’t know if I just focus just a little bit more and just know that some of these grind-it-out pars are actually moving up on the field.
“I think when the courses are pretty easy at different tournaments, if you make a bogey, you feel like you’ve moved back 30 spots, and over here in a major it’s not too bad. Just to keep your head in the game, it can get away from you so quick. I think something to do with the mindset for sure.
There are some similarities between The Los Angeles Country Club and some of the fine courses of the Melbourne sunbelt and Lee agreed. “Yeah, it reminds me of Royal Melbourne and a few Melbourne courses. It’s pretty brown for an American course. I think that’s what I look back at. I’ve played at Royal Melbourne plenty of times, and I love playing shots and not just hitting a straight shot, which I’ve been struggling with because some of the courses are pretty straight and I need to hit it straighter.
“But it’s nice to actual shape shots into greens on some of the tee shots.”
Against an even stronger field earlier this year, Lee managed to finish 6th at the Players Championship so has the knowledge that he can contend at this level.
“I think that was one of the times where I really thought I could actually contend and be there, and I had a couple bad holes at THE PLAYERS but I really didn’t think I was far off. Still held it at the end, and yeah, that gave me a lot of confidence for the tournaments coming through.”
Cam Smith – image USGA
Lee heads the Australasians by two shots over Cam Smith who assisted his cause with a round of 67 to be at 4 under and tied for 10th and very much in contention for a tilt as his second national open following his success at the Open Championship 11 months ago.
“I feel as though I’ve been playing good golf now for a couple of months,” said the Queenslander. “Just feels really solid. It feels like I’m not doing much wrong. I just need those, like I said, those longer putts, one or two to drop every round and I’m right there.
“I have felt pretty comfortable all week. I actually probably had a bit of a worse warm-up this morning and wasn’t really looking forward to getting off the tee, but, yeah, it kind of just come around and, yeah, ended up getting the irons going, getting the driver going again and yeah it was good.
“I think as these fairways firm up a little I think they will probably play a little bit narrower.
“But generally they’re pretty wide fairways, especially for a U.S. Open. I’ve been driving the ball great. I think I just got to keep the ball in the fairway and just keep hitting it into the centres of greens.
“There’s a ton of greens around there where you can get in really bad spots and get out of position and you’re looking at 5 or 6 pretty quick.”
New Zealand’s Ryan Fox is the only other Australasian to make the weekend despite a second round of 74. He just made it on the cut mark but he had done well to play his last seven holes in even par to be around for the final 36 holes.
Lucas Herbert and Adam Scott (5 over) Karl Vilips and Jason Day (9 over) and Cameron Davis (11 over) all missed the cut of 2 over and rounded out the Australasians.
