Hyojoo Kim will attempt to reclaim the top spot in stroke average in the LPGA Tour’s season finale.

Hyojoo Kim will compete in the LPGA Tour’s season finale, the CME Group Tour Championship, beginning Sept. 16 at the par-72 Tiburon Golf Club Gold Course in Naples, Fla.

The tournament is open to the top 60 players on the CME Globe Points list, a measure of a player’s season-long performance. As the season finale, the tournament will determine the major individual titles, including player of the year, money list, and stroke average. However, the Rookie of the Year award was clinched last week by Hae-ran Kim.

Kim has been a consistent performer this season with eight top-10 finishes in 19 events, including one victory. She finished fourth in CME Globe Points.

Her steady play has kept her at the top of the stroke average since midseason, but she lost ground to Thailand’s Ataya Thititjerin during her absence from the Anika Driven by Gainbridge at Pelican, which concluded on March 13.

Kim is 0.013 strokes behind first-place Ataya Thittinjorn (69.676) with a round-round average of 69.689. To win the Bear Trophy, which is awarded to the player with the best gross average, Kim will need to shoot at least one stroke less than Thititjer in the final round. It’s not an impossible challenge.

Kim would be the seventh South Korean to win the Bear Trophy for best stroke average. In 2003, Park Se-ri became the first Korean player to win the Bear Trophy. Park won it the following year, followed by Choi Na-yeon (2010), Park In-bee (2012), Jeon In-ji (2016) and Ko Jin-young (2019).

Kim also left the door open for her to become the LPGA Tour’s money winner. Lilia Buga leads the money list with $3.252 million. The first-place prize in this tournament is $2 million. Kim, who has $2,088,562, could also win the money list if she wins, depending on how the other players perform.

The race for Player of the Year is between Boo (196 points) and Celine Boutier (169 points).

The CME Group Tour Championship has been won by back-to-back South Korean players, including Se-Young Kim in 2019 and 2020 and Jin-Young Ko in 2021. Last year, New Zealander Lydia Ko took the top spot.

However, the defending champion will not be able to defend her title as she is not in the top 60 in CME Globe Points. 캡틴토토 도메인