Wie falters late on
Michelle Wie will have to try again if she wants to be the first woman ever to qualify for the US Open.
After a promising start – a morning 68 left her in joint 13th place with 18 places at Winged Foot available – the 16-year-old phenomenon fell away to a second-round 75 in the qualifying tournament in New Jersey.
She looked like finishing about 60th, but in a field of 153 it was for most of the day a superb effort watched by so many fans that Canoe Brook Country Club had to limit attendance.
Wie, who won a local qualifier in Hawaii last month, did not disappoint them before lunch, sinking a 60-foot chip shot on the 18th hole to complete her first bogey-free round against the men.
By that point, a gallery that had numbered several hundred fans when she teed off had become thousands. With no public parking at the club, spectators were diverted to the parking lot at a nearby shopping mall.
When the crowd reached an estimated 3,500 people, officials from the Metropolitan Golf Association allowed new spectators in only when others exited.
Wie did have her first bogey when she resumed, driving into a bunker, but a 10-foot putt at the 17th, her eighth, brought her back to two under par.
With six holes remaining and still on the same mark it looked as though she had to play them in one under for a possible play-off and two under to be safe, but she then three-putted for bogey and did the same on the next, missing from three feet both times.
Missing the fairway at the sixth cost her another shot and with that she and the crowd knew she had lost too much ground.
“I’m not really sure what went wrong,” said Wie. “I had a couple of bad putts here and there. Unfortunately they came when I didn’t want them too.
“I was hitting the ball well and felt I was putting solidly but these greens are really tricky.”
