MANILA – Filipina-Japanese golfer Yuka Saso made another career milestone. She moved up to fifth place in the latest Rolex World Rankings released on Tuesday.
It was a historic feat for the reigning US Women’s Open champion. She became the first-ever Filipina golfer to breach the top five in the world golf rankings.
Prior to this, the 20-year-old Saso was lingering at No. 6 and No. 7 before slipping to the latter spot despite a decent finish at tied-19th at the Shoprite Classic last week.
Saso, who competed in the women’’s division of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics in August, bolstered her rankings after finishing at fourth spot in the Founders Cup.
Saso submitted an average of 5.70 points (222.37 total points after 39 events) to surpass Australian Minjee Lee (5.54 average on 332.52 points after 60 events) and Japenese Nasa Hataoka (5.48 average on 301.23 points after 55 events).
Saso will be taking a break the next two weeks and will not compete when the LPGA Tour flies to Busan, South Korea for the BMW Ladies Open on Oct. 21.
USA’s Nelly Korda kept her place atop the rankings despite the resurgence of South Korea’s Ko Jin-Young who is on fire after a runner-up finish in Shoprite and the win in Founders.
Meanwhile, another 2020 Tokyo Olympics participant Bianca Pagdanganan maintained her place at 163rd despite not participating in any tournament during the week.
Pagdanganan previously climbed to her current standing after a t-27th finish at Shoprite, gaining some valuable points after missing the cut in NW Arkansas.
Veteran Dottie Ardina, on the other hand, was the biggest gainer among the Filipino golfers. She jumped to 154th place, 16 places higher than last week./PN
