Lorena Ochoa fired a five-under par 68 on Sunday to hold off Norway’s Suzanne Pettersen and win her second straight Corona Championship LPGA title.
Ochoa, who also won the tournament in her homeland in 2006, nabbed back-to-back birdies at 15 and 16 to break out of a tie with Pettersen.
She won with a 25-under total of 267.
Ochoa had to make do without regular caddie Dave Booker around the Tres Marias Country Club course after he was injured playing soccer on Saturday.
She called on childhood coach Rafael Alarcon and with him on the bag Ochoa collected her 26th career title and second this season.
Ochoa also notched her third career LPGA victory in Mexico, where she has played 11 of the 13 tournaments sanctioned by the US women’s tour.
South Korea’s Choi Na-yeon finished third after a 70 for 274. American Wendy Ward was a further stroke back after a 70 for 275.
Taiwan’s Yani Tseng was tied for fifth on 276, while compatriot Teresa Lu tied for 17th on 283.
■ZURICH CLASSIC
AFP, NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA
US veteran Jerry Kelly won his first title in seven years on Sunday, fighting back after squandering the lead to win the US$6.2 million PGA Zurich Classic by one stroke.
Kelly, who led by three strokes when the day began, won in his 200th start since his last victory at the 2002 Western Open, firing a final-round one-under par 71 to finish 72 holes on 14-under par 274.
South Africa’s Rory Sabbatini, South Korean Charlie Wi and American Charles Howell shared second on 275. Sabbatini fired a 67 while Howell and Wi each shot 68s. Americans Steve Marino and David Toms shared fifth on 276.
Howell made a furious charge to the lead from four off the pace at the start with birdies on six of the first 11 holes, including back-to-backs starting on the second and fifth holes as well as the ninth and 11th holes.
But Howell came home two-over in the last seven holes, bogeys on the 15th and 17th thwarting his title bid.
“I got myself in position,” Howell said. “I wish I could have finished it a little better.”
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier