Hyo Joo Kim sets 54-hole LPGA record and builds 4-shot lead over Korda

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Hyo Joo Kim sets 54-hole LPGA record and builds 4-shot lead over Korda

2026-03-29 09:43 Last Updated At：09:50

PHOENIX (AP) — Hyo Joo Kim blew past Nelly Korda and right into the LPGA record book Saturday with her second score this week of 11-under 61, giving her the lowest 54-hole score in LPGA history and a four-shot lead in the Ford Championship.

Kim had seven consecutive one-putt greens, including her torrid start to the back nine on the Cattail course at Whirlwind Golf Club when she went birdie-birdie-eagle-birdie as she started to pull away.

Even her bad shots turned out good. On the par-4 16th, the 30-year-old South Korean looked away in disgust when she pulled her approach, only for the ball to bounce right and take the slope down to 7 feet for yet another birdie.

She had a two-putt birdie on the 17th, and her par on the 18th put her at 25-under 191, breaking by one shot the 54-hole record previous shared by four players.

“All round everything was great — putter, iron, driver, everything was as I would want it to go,” Kim said.

There was little Korda could do about. She started with a two-shot lead, posted a bogey-free 67 and goes into the final round trailing by four shots.

“It was great,” Korda said. “I mean, playing with someone like Hyo Joo today it didn’t feel like that good of a round. She played unbelievable golf, putted really well. Overall, I'm never going to complain about a bogey-free round and 5 under. So it was solid.”

Kim is the defending champion in Phoenix, and she is coming off a victory last week in the Founders Cup when she held off a late rally by Korda to win by one. Sunday will be their fifth consecutive round playing in the same group.

“Nelly is my favorite player. It's been great playing together,” Kim said.

Kim also shot a 61 in the opening round when morning conditions were ripe for good scoring. That round was overlooked because Lydia Ko shot a 60. Ko has faded since then with rounds of 71 and 69, while the South Korean with the smooth putting touch has soared.

Kim took only 25 putts in the third round. Korda had said Friday after her third straight round playing with Kim, “Watching someone putt the way that she does, I mean it's always so mesmerizing for me.”

Mimi Rhodes, the 24-year-old LPGA rookie from England, earlier posted a 63 and was in a large group tied for third that included Ko, Chizzy Iwai, Minami Katsu and Ina Yoon. But all of them are nine shots behind.

Sunday was shaping up as a two-person race between players who already have won this year. Korda took the season opener that was cut to 54 holes because of extreme cold and wind in Florida, while Kim won last week at Sharon Heights.

At stake for Kim is a chance to break the 72-hole record set by Sei Young Kim at 257 in the 2018 Thornberry Creek LPGA Classic.

“You see her make putt over putt over putt and hit really good shots, but you have to really remind yourself that it’s just Saturday,” Korda said. “There is still 18 more holes left.”

AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf

'No Kings' rallies draw crowds across US, in Europe. Springsteen headlines Minnesota demonstration

ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — Large crowds protested Saturday against the war in Iran and President Donald Trump's actions in “No Kings” rallies across the U.S. and in Europe. Minnesota took center stage, with thousands of people standing shoulder-to-shoulder to celebrate resistance to Trump's aggressive immigration enforcement.

Minnesota's flagship event on the Capitol lawn in St. Paul drew Bruce Springsteen as its headliner. He and other speakers praised the state's people for taking to the streets over the winter in opposition to a surge of U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement agents.

Springsteen performed “ Streets of Minneapolis,” the song he wrote in response to the fatal shootings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti by federal agents. Springsteen lamented Good and Pretti’s deaths but said the state's pushback against ICE has given the rest of the country hope.

“Your strength and your commitment told us that this was still America,” he said. “And this reactionary nightmare, and these invasions of American cities, will not stand.”

People rallied from New York City, with almost 8.5 million residents in a solidly blue state, to Driggs, a town of fewer than 2,000 people in eastern Idaho, a state Trump carried with 66% of the vote in 2024.

U.S. organizers have estimated that the first two rounds of No Kings rallies drew more than 5 million people in June and 7 million in October. This week they told reporters they expected 9 million participants Saturday, though it was too early to tell whether those expectations were met.

Organizers said more than 3,100 events — 500 more than in October — were registered, in all 50 states.

Protests were mostly peaceful, but federal authorities deployed tear gas “due to demonstrators throwing large concrete blocks, bottles and other objects” near a federal detention center in downtown Los Angeles, police said on the social platform X. LAPD also said protesters were later arrested for failing to disperse.

Earlier in Topeka, Kansas, a rally outside the Statehouse had people impersonating a frog king and Trump as a baby. Wendy Wyatt drove with “Cats Against Trump” sign from Lawrence, 20 miles (32 kilometers) to the east, and planned to drive back to her hometown for a later rally there.

Wyatt said “there are so many things” about the Trump administration that upset her, but “this is very hopeful to me.”

White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson characterized them as the product of “leftist funding networks” with little real public support.

The “only people who care about these Trump Derangement Therapy Sessions are the reporters who are paid to cover them,” Jackson said in a statement.

The National Republican Congressional Committee was also sharply critical.

“These Hate America Rallies are where the far-left’s most violent, deranged fantasies get a microphone,” NRCC spokesperson Maureen O’Toole said.

Trump's immigration enforcement push, particularly in Minnesota, was just one item on a long list of protester grievances that also included the war in Iran and the rollback of transgender rights. Speakers at the Minnesota rally decried billionaires' economic power.

In Washington, hundreds marched past the Lincoln Memorial and into the National Mall, holding signs that read “Put down the crown, clown” and “Regime change begins at home.” Demonstrators rang bells, banged drums and chanted “No kings.”

Bill Jarcho was there from Seattle, joined by six people dressed as insects wearing tactical vests that said, “LICE” — spoofing ICE — as part of what he called a “mock and awe” tour.

“What we provide is mockery to the king,” Jarcho said. “It’s about taking authoritarianism and making fun of it, which they hate.”

About 40,000 people marched in San Diego, police there said.

In New York, Donna Lieberman, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, said during a news conference that Trump and his supporters want people to be afraid to protest.

“They want us to be afraid that there’s nothing we can do to stop them,” she said. “But you know what? They are wrong — dead wrong.”

Organizers said two-thirds of RSVPs for the rallies came from outside of major urban centers. That included communities in conservative-leaning states like Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, Utah, South Dakota and Louisiana, as well in electorally competitive suburbs in Pennsylvania, Georgia and Arizona.

Organizers designated the rally there as the national flagship event.

Before Springsteen took the stage, organizers played a video in which actor Robert DeNiro said he wakes up every morning depressed because of Trump but was happier Saturday because millions of people were protesting. He also congratulated Minnesotans for running ICE out of town.

The bill also included singer Joan Baez, actor Jane Fonda, Vermont U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders and a long list of activists, labor leaders and elected officials.

Protesters held up a massive sign on the Capitol steps that read, “We had whistles, they had guns. The revolution starts in Minneapolis.”

“Donald Trump may pretend that he’s not listening, but he can’t ignore the millions in the streets today,” said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers.

Demonstrations were also planned in more than a dozen other countries, from Europe to Latin America to Australia, according to Ezra Levin, a co-executive director of Indivisible, a group spearheading the events. In countries with constitutional monarchies, people call the protests “No Tyrants,” he said.

In Rome, thousands marched with chants aimed at Premier Giorgia Meloni, whose conservative government saw its referendum for streamlining Italy's judiciary fail badly this week. Protesters also waved banners protesting Israeli and US attacks on Iran.

In London, demonstrators held banners with slogans such as “Stop the far right” and “Stand up to Racism.”

And in Paris, several hundred people, mostly Americans living in France, along with labor unions and human rights organizations, gathered at the Bastille.

“I protest all of Trump’s illegal, immoral, reckless, and feckless, endless wars,” organizer Ada Shen said.

Richmond reported from Madison, Wisconsin, and Hanna from Topeka, Kansas. Associated Press journalists Nicholas Garriga in Paris, Mike Pesoli in Washington, Colleen Berry in Milan and Amy Taxin in Santa Ana, California, contributed.