The TOTO Japan Classic is on tap this week for the LPGA Tour at Seta Golf Course in Shiga, Japan. The 78-player field, comprised of 43 LPGA Tour members and 35 JLPGA Tour members, will compete for a share of a $2 million purse and Race to the CME Globe points, the latter of which will only go to LPGA Tour members and non-members who accept membership if they happen to win. Past champions Gemma Dryburgh, Ai Suzuki, Mi Hyang Lee and Jiyai Shin are teeing it up, as are Japanese major champions Ayaka Furue and Yuka Saso, 2024 FM Championship winner Haeran Ryu and Japanese Olympian Miyu Yamashita.

Take a look at just a few of the featured groups this week at the TOTO Japan Classic using data provided by KPMG Performance Insights.

Thursday, 9:28 a.m.* – Gemma Dryburgh/Moriya Jutanugarn/Miyuu Abe

Gemma Dryburgh became a Rolex First-Time Winner at the 2022 TOTO Japan Classic, defeating Kana Nagai to win by four shots at Seta Golf Course. She is making her third start in the event this week, and in addition to her victory two years ago, the Scotswoman also tied for sixth at the TOTO Japan Classic in her title defense last year. According to KPMG Performance Insights, the 31-year-old has recorded five rounds of 67 or lower, has a score to par of 39-under and has gained 2.87 strokes total on the rest of the field with a birdie or better percentage of 31.3 percent in her previous two appearances. The TOTO Japan Classic is Dryburgh’s 25th start of the 2024 LPGA Tour season, and in her 24 prior events, she has missed 10 cuts and earned six top-25 finishes, the best of which is a tie for ninth that came at the season-opening Hilton Grand Vacations Tournament of Champions in January and one of which was a tie for 17th that came at The Amundi Evian Championship in July, the year’s penultimate major championship. Statistically, Dryburgh is only picking up shots in one major strokes gained category this season, currently ranking 25th in strokes gained around the green (+0.18).

Moriya Jutanugarn collected her third career LPGA Tour victory earlier this season at the Portland Classic, winning by two shots over rookie Nataliya Guseva at Columbia Edgewater Country Club to take home her first title since the Dow Championship in 2021. In addition to her win, the elder Jutanugarn sister has picked up one other top-10 result this season, tying for fifth at the T-Mobile Match Play presented by MGM Rewards, and has racked up five other top-25 finishes, the best of which are three T21s that she earned at the Blue Bay LPGA, the Ford Championship presented by KCC and Mizuho Americas Open. The Thailand native is making her eighth start in the TOTO Japan Classic this week, and in her seven previous appearances in this event, she has only earned one top-10 finish, a tie for fifth that came in 2017 at Taiheiyo Club’s Minori Course. She is making her first start in this tournament since she tied for 36th in 2022. Statistically, Jutanugarn is in the top 25 of one strokes gained category this season, according to KPMG Performance Insights, currently sitting at 25th in strokes gained putting (+0.49). She is also picking up strokes on approach (56, +0.17) and around the green (50, +0.07).

Round out this group is Miyuu Abe of the JLPGA Tour. This is Abe’s second-ever start on the LPGA Tour, as she also competed in last year’s TOTO Japan Classic, ultimately finishing T56 in her LPGA debut. She has one win on the JLPGA Tour that came earlier this season at the Fujifilm Studio Alice Ladies Open and has made ¥44,187,028 on the JLPGA so far this year.

Thursday, 9:50 a.m. – Brooke Henderson/Haeran Ryu/Miyu Yamashita

Brooke Henderson is teeing it up in the TOTO Japan Classic for just the third time in her LPGA Tour career this week in Shiga, Japan. She has never finished better than T41 at this event, something the Canadian will be working to rectify this year at Seta Golf Course. This is her 22nd event of the 2024 LPGA Tour season, and in her 20 previous tournaments, the 13-time LPGA Tour winner has earned eight top-10 finishes, the most recent of which is a tie for 10th that she recorded at last week’s Maybank Championship and the most notable of which is a tie for third that came at The Chevron Championship in April. Henderson has also finished in the top 26 of two other major championships this year, tying for 22nd at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship at Sahalee Country Club, where Henderson captured her first career major title, and tying for 26th at The Amundi Evian Championship in Evian-les-Bains, France. Statistically, the Rolex Women’s World Golf Rankings No. 22 is picking up shots in every major strokes gained category, according to KPMG Performance Insights. She most notably ranks 12th in strokes gained driving (+0.54), 18th in strokes gained total (+1.19) and 23rd in strokes gained tee to green (+0.88). She leads the LPGA Tour this season in most top-10 finishes without a victory at eight and is one of five players to be ranked inside the top 20 in strokes gained total over the course of the last three seasons. Henderson is also ranked 16th in both scoring average (70.88) and rounds in the 60s (26) this year.

Haeran Ryu is making her tournament debut at the TOTO Japan Classic this week after what’s been an incredibly solid stretch of golf for the 23-year-old. In her last 11 LPGA Tour starts, the 2023 Louise Suggs Rolex Rookie of the Year has collected her second career LPGA Tour victory, winning the FM Championship after defeating former Rolex Rankings No. 1 Jin Young Ko in a playoff at TPC Boston, and recorded seven additional top-10 results. Two of those top 10s came in major championships as Ryu tied for ninth at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship and finished solo fifth at the Amundi Evian Championship, and two of them came in back-to-back starts during the Asian swing, with Ryu tying for sixth at the BMW Ladies Championship and finishing solo third last week at the Maybank Championship. Ryu earned four more top 10s in the first five months of the 2024 season, tying for ninth at both the Honda LPGA Thailand and the T-Mobile Match Play presented by MGM Rewards, finishing solo fifth at The Chevron Championship and coming in third at the JM Eagle LA Championship presented by Plastpro. Because of her spectacular play this year, Ryu is up to sixth in the Rolex Rankings and is now second in the Race to the CME Globe point standings, but she is still 1,136.427 points behind current Race leader Nelly Korda with just four events left on the 2024 schedule, including the TOTO Japan Classic. According to KPMG Performance Insights, Ryu is ranked first on Tour this year in strokes gained tee to green (+1.88), second in strokes gained approach (+1.49), fifth in strokes gained total (+1.89) and 11th in strokes gained driving (+0.58). She is also first in rounds in the 60s (34), first in birdies (334), second in greens in regulation percentage (76.60%), third in birdie or better percentage (23.75%) and fourth in scoring average (70.14). Additionally, the Republic of Korea native has been in the top three in strokes gained tee to green in four of her last five tournaments on the LPGA Tour and has been gaining an average of 2.08 strokes per round with her approach shots since July 1, the most of any player in that same span, looking at data provided by KPMG.

Miyu Yamashita is a 12-time winner on the JLPGA Tour, capturing her most recent title earlier this month at the Fujitsu Ladies after defeating Ayaka Furue in a playoff. This is her sixth LPGA Tour start this season as Yamashita teed it up in all five major championships in 2024, earning three top-20 results with a tie for second showing at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship, a tie for 12th at the U.S. Women’s Open presented by Ally and a tie for 17th at The Chevron Championship. She has competed in six other LPGA Tour events ahead of this season, including the 2022 and 2023 TOTO Japan Classics, where she finished T5 and T27, respectively. Yamashita represented Japan in August at the 2024 Paris Olympics alongside Yuka Saso and ultimately finished in a tie for fourth at Le Golf National. She is currently 13th in the Rolex Women’s World Golf Rankings.

Thursday, 10:01 a.m. – Jin Young Ko/Ayaka Furue/Rio Takeda

Jin Young Ko is making just her second career start in the TOTO Japan Classic, having last teed it up in this event in 2018, where she ultimately finished in a tie for fifth. This is just her 16th tournament of the 2024 season, as Ko took a break from LPGA Tour competition in September, and in her 15 other events this year, she has earned six top-10 finishes, two of which are runner-up performances that came at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship at Sahalee Country Club, where Ko tied for second, and the FM Championship, where she fell in a playoff to her fellow Republic of Korea native Haeran Ryu. Looking at data provided by KPMG Performance Insights, Ko is leading the LPGA Tour in average proximity to the hole from 100 to 125 yards (16 feet 5 inches) and is fourth in proximity from 125 to 150 yards (22 feet 8 inches). The Rolex Rankings No. 9 is also third on Tour in strokes gained approach (+1.21), 13th in strokes gained total (+1.38) and 26th in strokes gained tee to green (+0.86). The 15-time LPGA Tour winner has yet to find victory lane this season, and if she isn’t able to pull out a win in any of her upcoming starts, 2024 will be the first year since 2017 that Ko has not won at least once on the LPGA Tour.

Japan native Ayaka Furue has had a stellar 2024 season on the LPGA Tour, winning her first career major title at The Amundi Evian Championship and earning nine other top-10 results this year, the most notable of which is a tie for sixth that came at the U.S. Women’s Open at Lancaster Country Club. She hasn’t found the top 10 on the LPGA Tour since tying for third at the ISPS Handa Women’s Scottish Open in August, but the TOTO Japan Classic is an event in which Furue has had prior success. The 24-year-old has made two starts in this tournament since joining the LPGA Tour in 2022, tying for fifth as a rookie at Seta Golf Course and then finishing in a tie for 23rd last year at Taiheiyo Club’s Minori Course, two results she will be working to better this week in front of a home-country crowd. According to KPMG Performance Insights, Furue is ranked inside the top 20 in four strokes gained categories so far this season, including strokes gained total (3, +1.93), strokes gained approach (8, +0.97), strokes gained putting (12, +0.76) and strokes gained tee to green (17, +1.00). She has made 154 putts outside of 10 feet this year and is tied for second-most of any player in 2024 in that metric alongside Anna Nordqvist. Furue is also ranked first in bogey avoidance (11.68%), third in scoring average (70.09), third in rounds in the 60s (33) and sixth in driving accuracy (82.23%).

Rio Takeda has played in five LPGA Tour events over the last two seasons, teeing it up and finishing T8 at the 2023 TOTO Japan Classic and then competing in four of this year’s major championships, including the U.S. Women’s Open, KPMG Women’s PGA Championship, The Amundi Evian Championship and AIG Women’s Open. She finished in a tie for ninth at Lancaster Country Club in early June, earning her second career top-10 result on the LPGA Tour in Pennsylvania in her U.S. Women’s Open debut.

All times local

*Off No. 10

For a full list of tee times, please click here.

Featured Groups: 2024 TOTO Japan Classic

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