The LPGA Hops to Japan

This week the LPGA is in Japan for the TOTO Japan Classic. There are only two tournaments left after this one -- Lorena Ochoa's event in Mexico next week and the Tour Championship in Florida the week after.

As usual, Tony Jesselli has a preview of this week's event at his blog.



Sun-Ju Ahn is the defending champion at this event, although I'm uncertain that she's the focus this week:

• Lydia Ko and Ariya Jutanugarn are both playing, and Lydia still trails Ariya by 13 points in the Player of the Year race. Lydia beat Ariya last week but didn't finish high enough to get any points.
• Shanshan Feng is coming off her first win of the year -- not counting the Olympic Bronze Medal -- and seems to be in good form for the remaining tournaments.
• As Tony points out in his blog, Japanese star Haru Nomura is after her third win of the year.
• And in case you didn't know, there's always a big competition between the Koreans and the Japanese when playing on either's home soil.

This is only a three-day event, and we get tape-delay coverage here in the US. On the bright side, today's coverage starts at 10am ET on GC so at least we'll all be awake to see it.

And remember: The Top3 in the Race to the CME Globe can win it all with a win at the Tour Championship. Currently those three are Ariya, Lydia and Brooke Henderson. Brooke isn't playing this week because she finally took a week off, but she's so far ahead of fourth-place Sei Young Kim that these three are probably going to be the Top3 at the Tour Championship.