Yang halfway to first LPGA victory

ORLANDO, Fla. - South Korea's Amy Yang may not have won yet on the LPGA, but she knows what winning is all about.

Yang, who shot a 70 Friday at Grand Cypress GC to take a three-stroke lead into the weekend at the LPGA Tour Championship, is only 21 but she won a Ladies European Tour event as an amateur when she was 16 years, 9 months, 18 days old - the youngest winner in LET history.

"I think I was too young to know what winning a tournament meant," Yang said of her triumph at the 2006 ANZ Ladies Masters. "After that, I had to finish high school."

Yang's education as a golfer continued on the LET, where she won twice in 2008. She joined the LPGA in 2009 and has five top-10 finishes this season, highlighted by T-5s at the U.S. Women's Open and Ricoh Women's British Open.

One of Yang's strengths is her ability to shake off a bad shot or bad hole. She did that very well in the second round at Grand Cypress. After consecutive bogeys on the eighth and ninth holes, she quickly birdied Nos. 11, 12 and 14 and added another at the 18th to finish 36 holes at seven-under 137, three better than Seon Hwa Lee and Maria Hjorth.

"You never know what's going to happen," Yang said. "I'm just going to try to do what I did the last two rounds. I'm just going to do my best."

That could easily be good enough for her maiden LPGA victory.

-- Bill Fields