Peru’s Ximena Benites is the only leader after round one of the Women´s Amateur Latin America, organised by The R&A and the Annika Foundation. The player from Trujillo signed for a 2-under-par round of 70 to move to the top of the leaderboard, one stroke ahead of a group of six players at 1-under par. 

“I kept calm despite the double bogey at the par-3, 6th hole. I tried to stay in the present and to make some birdies because I still had many holes left to play. My game on the greens was spot-on and that was the key,” said Benites, who just signed with the University of Iowa and will be a freshman in the fall of 2023.

“I’m the only one in my family who plays golf. Actually, they didn’t know what this game was about until I started playing at the age of eight,” said Benites who has won several tournaments in her home country, she was runner-up at the 2022 New Jersey Junior PGA Championship and 5th at the 2022 Optimist Junior International. Those performances allowed her to reach the 770th place on the WAGR.

Just one stroke behind Benites sit Ana Isabel González Cantu (Mexico), Daniela Ballesteros (Peru), Lauren Daiana Olivares León (Mexico), Vanesa Gilly (Venezuela), María Morales Zubizarreta (Paraguay), and Valentina Rossi (Argentina), who finished third in 2021.

The best-ranked player in the field and one of the favourites, María José Marín, had an up-and-down start. The Colombian scored 73, one-over-par, and is currently T12, three strokes behind the leader.

The wind was very difficult during the first round, yielding just seven rounds under par out of the sixty players in the field at Pilar Golf. In 2021, champion Valery Plata had a final score 276 (-12) in a week when only two players broke par: the champion and runner-up Majo Marín.

On Friday, at 2:00 P.M. local time and while the players are out on the golf course, Mark Lawrie, Director The R&A Latin America and the Caribbean, will offer a press conference on topics related to the development of golf in the region.

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