Chizzy Iwai matches tournament record for first round lead at El Cab
By Amy Rogers
On an idyllic morning at El Caballero Country Club in which temperatures reached the mid-70s and there was plentiful sunshine, Chizzy Iwai took advantage of the calm conditions to match the tournament scoring record with a 9-under 63 at the JM Eagle LA Championship presented by Plastpro.
“Did you see the sky? Today, I saw sky circle rainbow,” Iwai said after surging to the leaderboard on Thursday morning. “So, lucky day today.”
The 23-year old from Japan began her day on the back nine at El Cab and recorded birdies on holes Nos. 11-15 to go 5-under par on her first six holes of the day. Iwai then holed out at the par 5, 16th hole for eagle to climb to 7-under par through seven holes and carded an outward nine of 29. Iwai said the thought of shooting 59, or even 58, did cross her mind during Thursday’s opening round but she says she tried to push it out of her mind and instead focused on her routine.
At the turn, Iwai recorded her sixth birdie of the day and added her seventh and final birdie of the day at the par 4, fifth hole (Iwai’s 14th hole of the day) for a bogey-free round.
“Every hole my driver was so consistent,” Iwai said about her round in which she missed just three fairways and one green. “I had good feeling. I had fun.”
The wind picked up in the afternoon in the San Fernando Valley, which made for tougher conditions than those faced by Iwai, who leads by two-strokes ahead of major champions Patty Tavatanakit and Sei Young Kim, along with rookie Suvichaya Vinijchaitham, who sit at 7-under par.
Tavatanakit carded eight birdies offset by a single bogey to card a 7-under par round of 65 for her lowest round on the LPGA Tour since Feb. 2025.
Tavatanakit says the rolling hills and changing elevations around El Cab are something she’s been trying to adjust to in recent weeks as she’s still trying to get back into competitive mode now five starts into the season.
“I feel like I've been kind of building that ever since San Francisco, when we were there. I mean, I feel like my game has always been there. Just a little bit here and there is just kind of rusty,” Tavatanakit said about her game in recent weeks. “My ball striking felt really good today. Yeah, just a solid day. Made a lot of putts. Overall I'm pretty pleased. But, yeah, still got a lot of work to do I guess.”
Kim went out in the afternoon and says she was able to use the wind to her advantage, especially at the par 5s, including at the 16th where she says she was left with a pitching wedge into the green where she was able to make an easy birdie. Despite missing half the fairways on Thursday, Kim missed just one green as she went about carding eight birdies and a single bogey for her low round at El Cab.
“Very dry golf course conditions, so greens are really fast. Every putt I try to make the distance,” Kim said about her round in which she had 29 putts. “It's tough, which means I'm not trying too hard, so it makes a lot of birdies on the course.”
Chella Choi, Manon De Roey, Polly Mack, and Jessica Porvasnik sit in a pack at 6-under par. They were joined in the afternoon by Lauren Coughlin, Jasmine Suwannapura, Nataliya Guseva, Kumkang Park, and Natasha Oon.
“I saw some really low scores and I was in the afternoon wave and I was like, ‘wow, these girls are killing it out there’,” said Oon, who has been sidelined with a foot injury for the past two years. “I had a few looks at the course beforehand and I was so confused the whole time. Like this is not possible. This is a crazy course. But just to shoot 6-under and tell myself that's possible for you, that's pretty cool.”
Choi returned to the LPGA Tour in October at the BMW Ladies Championship where she made her first start since giving birth to her first child. The 35-year old Tour veteran was grouped on Thursday with Alison Lee, who is making her full-time return to competition at the JM Eagle LA Championship following the birth of her first child in 2025.
“We talked actually all day about our babies, and even though Alison had a baby one year later than mine they're actually the same size,” Choi said through a translator. “I had a lot of expectations going into my first tournament coming back, and I think I really realized I felt really out of it and my game wasn't there. So I think I'm really trying to focus in on those aspects, so I'm finding that.”
Defending champion Ingrid Lindblad, who won the JM Eagle LA Championship at 21-under par in 2025, opened with a round of 3-under par, 69.
El Cab is hosting the JM Eagle LA Championship for the second consecutive season while Wilshire Country Club, the tournament’s former home, continues to undergo course renovations. The course is located 21 miles northwest of downtown Los Angeles and was unharmed by the devastating wildfires that ravaged the local community in 2025.
