The PIF Saudi Ladies International, the season opener for the Ladies European Tour (LET), offers a total purse of $5 million. Excluding five major championships and the LPGA Tour's season-ending CME Group Tour Championship, this represents the largest prize pool on tour. The winner's share alone stands at $750,000.
Two Korean golfers have positioned themselves to capture the substantial prize: Choi Hye-jin, who has accumulated the most career earnings among winless players on the LPGA Tour, and Yun Yi-na, who endured severe growing pains during her LPGA rookie season last year. Choi enters the final round tied for the lead, while Yun sits two strokes back in a tie for fourth.
In the third round held on January 13 at Riyadh Country Club (par 72) in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Choi fired a bogey-free 7-under-par 65 with seven birdies. After sharing the first-round lead at 8-under, she slipped to a tie for sixth when she failed to go lower in the second round. She has now returned to the top of the leaderboard. Choi's three-round total of 15-under-par 201 ties her with Takeda Rio of Japan for the lead. Choi made four birdies on the front nine and added three more on the back.
Unlike Choi's steady round, Yun experienced a roller-coaster day.
Starting with a bogey on the first hole (par 4), Yun recovered with birdies on holes 2 (par 5) and 4 (par 4). Her putting then faltered briefly—she missed a par putt from just over one meter on the fifth hole (par 5) and three-putted for bogey on the sixth (par 3).
Bae So-hyun and Park Hye-jun are tied for 13th at 11-under-par 205, keeping their hopes alive for a come-from-behind victory.
After a birdie on the eighth hole (par 3) brought her to even par for the front nine, Yun launched an aggressive charge on the back. Following her first back-nine birdie on the 11th hole (par 4), she went for the green in two on the par-5 12th and converted for eagle—her second of the tournament after eagling the fifth hole in the first round.
Yun added a birdie on the 15th hole (par 5) and stuck her approach to 1.2 meters on the final hole (par 4) to close with another birdie.
Cassandra Alexander of South Africa sits alone in third at 14-under-par 202. Sharing fourth place with Yun at 13-under are fellow Korean-American Alison Lee, Japan's Hataoka Nasa, Iwai Akie, and Iwai Chisato, Shannon Tan of Singapore, and Carlota Ciganda of Spain.