DALY CITY, Calif. – Brooke Henderson fiddles with her earrings between shots, purses her lips and anxiously watches each shot, then politely responds and makes eye contact when someone in the gallery engages her with a compliment.

Henderson is the new 17-year-old with serious swagger in women’s golf.

She shot a tournament-record 7-under 65 to take the lead halfway through the second round of the Swinging Skirts LPGA Classic on Friday.

“That’s pretty cool,” the 17-year-old Smiths Falls, Ont., native said about her low score.

That round put her at 9 under at Lake Merced Golf Club, where world No. 1 and defending champion Lydia Ko shot an even-par 72 to remain 5 under after taking the first-round lead Thursday. There were still afternoon rounds to play Friday, including by local favorite Juli Inkster after her opening 68.

Na Yeon Choi was two strokes back at after a 68. The 27-year-old South Korean eagled the par-5, 475-yard 14th and had three birdies on her front nine.

Yueer Cindy Feng of China stood in third place at 6 under.

As Ko celebrated her 18th birthday, she cleared the way for a new teen star to shine.

“I think I’m ready. Yeah, 17 is young,” Henderson said. “As you’ve seen with Lydia Ko and Lexi Thompson and even Jessica Korda, there are a lot of great names that have been able to do it. I’m hoping that I’m one of them.”

The long-driving Henderson eagled the 14th, hitting a 3-wood approach and making a 15-foot putt. She also had six birdies.

Henderson regularly hears how she is fearless and goes for it on shots when others might be more conservative, and that approach sure worked for her in the tricky conditions at Lake Merced.

Not that she has necessarily noticed any extra hype.

Caddie Bunk Lee insists they didn’t even know she had jumped to the top of the leaderboard in just her 10th career LPGA Tour event. Though Henderson grabbed a few glances at the leaderboard “here and there.”

“I was able to stay in a rhythm today,” Henderson said. “I got into it early, and I was able stay there all day, which was nice.”

She and her older sister, Brittany, tied for second place in last month’s Florida’s Natural Charity Classic, a Symetra Tour event that earned them each $10,000-plus paydays.

In many ways, Henderson – a member of Team Canada’s Young Pro Squad – appears to be a veteran unfazed by golf’s big stage.

“She’s far above most 17 year olds as far as maturity is concerned,” Lee said. “She’s very calm, she’s very patient, her thought process is very clear. Her ability to focus is astounding. … It’s an absolute joy to be on this bag.”

While she wasn’t particularly happy with her golf, Ko was serenaded with “Happy Birthday” and presented with a cake, and she covered her face briefly in embarrassment. Some 300 people followed her group in the gallery for parts of the round.

Ko, the first-round leader after a leading after a 67, drew an early tee time and had evening dinner plans to celebrate with friends. She got a new iPhone from her mother and her peers have told her she “upgraded.”

She was headed for some Korean barbecue, “go to the original roots.”

“No more singing, please,” Ko joked after her round. “Really cool to share this birthday with a lot of the people out here. Lots more time to celebrate tonight. It was a good day. It is really cool that now I’m an adult … big 18.”

And Ko found herself again talking about the fact age is no issue in golf, this time not about Inkster but someone younger – Henderson.

“She’s still 17 in a lot of ways, and that’s a good thing,” the caddie, Lee, said. “She’s not getting ahead of herself, and I think it’s very refreshing. We rolled into the parking lot and it started from there, and it was a good day.”

PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – The Quebec Championship has been dropped from the Champions Tour schedule. The event was scheduled for Sept. 4-6.

The PGA Tour announced the decision Friday, saying tournament organizers recently informed the Champions Tour they were unable to adequately fund a full-field event this year following financial difficulties last season during the inaugural tournament.

Wes Short Jr. won in September at La Tempete Golf Club in Quebec City. The tournament was the first PGA Tour-sanctioned event in the area since the 1956 Labatt Open at Royal Quebec.

PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – Tiger Woods has added The Players Championship to his schedule, another indication that he is getting back to a normal golf season.

Woods won The Players the last time he played in 2013. He missed last year while recovering from back surgery that forced him to miss a combined seven months in 2014. He sat out two months earlier this year to work on his game – particularly his chipping – after posting a career-high 82 in Phoenix.

Woods is No. 106 in the world ranking and did not qualify for the Match Play Championship next week in San Francisco. The Players Championship is May 7-10.

Jack Nicklaus said earlier this week that Woods told him he would be at the Memorial, which is June 4-7.

Looking forward to going back to THE PLAYERS this year, hoping for a repeat of 2013.

— Tiger Woods (@TigerWoods) April 24, 2015

SHANGHAI – Julien Quesne shot a 5-under 67 Friday to take a one-stroke lead over defending champion Alexander Levy and Peter Uihlein after the second round at the Volvo China Open.

The Frenchman, a two-time winner on the European Tour, had six birdies and one bogey for an 8-under 136 overall score.

“We had less wind today so it was a little bit easier,” Quesne said. “I don’t miss many shots so I was very confident.”

Levy (68) was also playing confidently, making three straight birdies on the back nine to take a one-stroke lead at 9 under. But he tried to hit out of a bunker with an iron on the par-4 16th and went into the water, taking a double-bogey.

Then, on the par-3 17th, Levy hit into the bunker off the tee and two-putted for bogey. He got one stroke back with a birdie on the 18th – his seventh of the day.

“It’s a shame to make a double because I played really good today,” Levy said. “Maybe next time I do a different thing, a more safe play out of the bunker on the right, but it’s OK.”

Levy joked that he might make a bet with Quesne on who will perform better this weekend, but his friend still owes him 10 euros from a wager they made last week at the Shenzhen International about a shot that eventual champion Kiradech Aphibarnrat hit on the final day.

“Maybe tomorrow I ask him on the first tee. Maybe he give it to me,” the Frenchman said.

Uihlein finished his round with an iron shot over a water feature on the par-5 18th that rolled straight into the hole for eagle. It was only the second eagle of the day on the difficult greens at Tomson Golf Course.

“It’s funny you can go for really all of (the par 5 holes). I’ve gone for all of them this week,” the American said. “They’re really small, undulating greens. … You can see from the scoring, it’s a tricky little course.”

Both Quesne and Uihlein are coming off solid performances last week in Shenzhen, where they tied for fourth. Levy finished last season on a roll with a win at the Portugal Masters and a tie for second at the BMW Masters, but he’s yet to get a top-10 result this year.

Six golfers were just two strokes behind Levy and Uihlein on a crowded leaderboard, including Kiradech (68), rising Chinese star Li Haotong (68) and Matteo Manassero (68).

Manassero is trying to recapture the form that saw him become the youngest winner in European Tour history at 17 in 2010. The Italian said his game hit a low point over the past eight months when he failed to crack the top 40 at any tournament and missed five straight cuts to start the year.

He said he started to turn things around last week in Shenzhen, where he finished in a tie for 29th.

“I don’t want to say I’m out of the woods but I’m definitely in a much better path,” Manassero said. “I can still miss, but one mistake doesn’t drag me into something that leads to other mistakes. I can handle it. Probably that right now is what makes all the difference.”

LOMPOC, Calif. – France’s Julien Brun managed a 2-under 70 Thursday at La Purisima Golf Course to take the lead through three rounds at PGA Tour Canada’s California Qualifying Tournament.

The three-time NCAA first team All-American, who is playing as an amateur and will complete his collegiate career with the Texas Christian University Horned Frogs following Q-School this week, led by one over Albuquerque’s Sam Saunders, who is also competing as an amateur, along with Danville, California’s Jeff Hamm and League City, Texas native Curtis Donahoe.

“It was very solid. I didn’t put myself in many bad situations. I didn’t have to save many pars from all over the place, and it was really a stress-free round,” said Brun, who owns nine career NCAA victories along with a Challenge Tour win in 2012. “I was able to put myself in the fairway many times and gave myself a lot of opportunities despite the wind. It was a very good round.”

This week marks a stretch of important events coming up for Brun, who will join his teammates at the Big 12 conference championships immediately after Q-School, with NCAA Regional and National Championships in the following weeks. Still, Brun said his focus remains on earning status on PGA Tour Canada for when he begins his professional career later this spring.

“I’m just taking it one day and one hole at a time. It’s a tough course and a good field, so I can’t take it easy out there. I need to play my best,” said Brun.

Donahoe posted his second sub-par round of the week to reach 4-under with Hamm and Saunders, whose brother Steve is a Web.com Tour member and PGA Tour Canada alumnus, while 36-hole leader David Mills shared fifth spot with Nathan Tarter at 3-under.

Canada’s Taylor Pendrith slipped to eighth after a third-round 76.

The medalist this week will earn exempt status on PGA Tour Canada for 2015. Finishers 2-18 will be exempt through the first six events and subject to the re-shuffle, with the rest of the top 40 (plus ties) earning conditional status. The cutoff for the top 18 through the first round was at 3-over, with the cutoff for the top 40 at 7-over.

AVONDALE, La. – Boo Weekley solved his uncharacteristic ball-striking problems with new shafts.

A day after changing the shafts in his irons, Weekley shot an 8-under 64 on Thursday in the Zurich Classic of New Orleans for a share of the first-round lead with Brendon de Jonge.

“You go to tinkering around with clubs and you finally find a shaft, and (True Temper) finally stepped up and built me a set of clubs and they worked,” said Weekley, the three-time PGA Tour winner who missed the cuts in four of his past six tournaments. “I’ve been missing something in my game, and it was because I (haven’t) been able to control my irons. It just starts messing with you mentally.”

Weekley had an eagle, seven birdies and a bogey at rain-softened TPC Louisiana. De Jonge, from Zimbabwe, had eight birdies in a bogey-free round.

Sean O’Hair and Canada’s David Hearn shot 65 on the Pete Dye-designed layout.

Tour rookie Mark Hubbard had five consecutive birdies in the middle of his round and finished with a 66. He was tied with Erik Compton, Brian Davis, Greg Owen and Daniel Berger.

Dustin Johnson, ranked No. 7 in the world, was at 67 in a large group that included former Zurich winner K.J. Choi and Jason Day, the highest ranked player in the field at No. 6.

Weekley, from Milton, Florida, played in front of a number of family and friends. He eagled the par-5 second hole and added birdies on the fifth and eighth holes. He bogeyed the ninth, but rallied with birdies on Nos. 11-13 and closed with a birdie on the par-5 18th.

“I felt like if the putts would have fallen that I hit, I felt like it could have been a 59 easy,” Weekley said after posting his lowest score in more than two years. “I felt like I should have easily shot 8-under on the front side.”

De Jonge, starting on the back nine, birdied three consecutive holes after a par on his first hole and made the turn at 4 under. He had four straight birdies on the back, but failed to birdie the par-5 eighth.

De Jonge, who hit 12 of 14 fairways and 15 of 18 greens, played the par 4s in 7 under but was only 1 under on the par 5s in his lowest round of the year.

“I left a couple of shots on the par 5s but made it up on the par 4s,” said de Jonge, who added he has never played well at TPC New Orleans. “The course was there for the taking. You’ve obviously got to hit the fairways, but the tour let us play (lift, clean and place), so that was the key out there today.”

O’Hair was 3 under after his first two holes, including an eagle on the first when he knocked in his second shot from 123 yards. He was 7 under through his first 11 holes, but bogeyed the 12th before closing with a birdie on the 18th.

“I kind of caught myself pressing on the back nine,” said O’Hair, who has two top 10s in his past four tournaments, including a sixth-place finishes this past week at the RBC Heritage. “Once I got to 7 (under) I was kind of pushing a little bit, forcing a little bit on the greens.”

Players were allowed to lift, clean and place their balls in anticipation of showers that arrived in mid- afternoon, suspending play for 1 hour, 18 minutes. A calm wind for much of the day along with soft greens left the course defenseless.

“Hopefully, the weather (Friday) will be good,” Day said after a round in which he hit two balls in the water on the par-3 third for a double-bogey 5 and followed with a bogey on the fourth hole. “It will be good to see the course dry out, and obviously when the weather comes in it’s no fun for anyone.”

DALY CITY, Calif. – As Lydia Ko geared up to turn 18 on Friday at the Swinging Skirts LPGA Classic, right behind her on the leaderboard was 54-year-old Juli Inkster.

Refreshed and ready to make a run at defending her title, the top-ranked Ko returned from two weeks off to take the first-day lead Thursday at 5-under 67.

Ko nearly chipped in for eagle on the par-5 14th, but the ball deflected off the pin and she settled for a tap-in birdie putt, and that moved her to the top of the leaderboard at Lake Merced Golf Club.

“This is a very tough golf course. You need to position yourself well,” Ko said. “I hit the ball pretty good where I wasn’t in too much trouble. If I did miss it a little bit, I did get away with it, too. It’s a really good start but I know I’ve got three long days to go.”

Ko will celebrate her birthday on the course Friday then go out for a nice dinner with friends. Paired with Anna Nordqvist and Lexi Thompson, Ko pulled on a jacket midway through her round in the afternoon chill and finished strong.

Ko had a one-stroke lead over three others, including Inkster. Stacy Lewis, last year’s runner-up to Ko at Lake Merced, was two strokes back at 69.

“It was probably one of the craziest rounds of golf I’ve ever played,” said Lewis, who recovered from four bogeys on her front nine with an eagle on the par-4 11th and three birdies on the back.

Ko had birdies on consecutive holes three times – Nos. 5-6, 8-9 and 13-14 – with just one bogey.

“The first couple holes were playing down wind, so that made it a lot easier,” she said. “A lot depends on the wind. It really depends on the conditions of the day and the scores are really good.”

Ko was followed by a gallery of about 100 fans early, and first-day attendance seemed to be a noticeable improvement from a year ago for the tournament’s inaugural round. The wind picked up significantly in the afternoon.

Inkster, done hours earlier before the wind began whipping in earnest, quickly corrected the notion she is facing a talented LPGA field with women her daughters’ ages.

“Yeah, they’re a lot younger than my daughters,” she said with a grin. “They’re 25 and 21. Out here that’s a seasoned veteran. You know what, that’s the beauty about golf. I mean, age matters in a lot of things as far as how your body feels and how far you hit the ball and how much time you can put into it. You can still go out there and compete at 54.”

Inkster, a local icon, birdied six of her first 10 holes for a 68 on a cool, breezy morning off the ocean. She had no idea that put her on top of the leaderboard after the morning rounds.

“I didn’t know I was,” Inkster said. “The way I played today, no, I’m not surprised. … Coming into this week, my game feels pretty good.”

Lewis joked that a leaderboard with Inkster on top would make a good “Throwback Thursday” photo.

Ha Na Jang, who also shot a 68, made a 35-foot birdie putt on the par-3, 162-yard eighth for one of her eight birdies. P.K. Kongkraphan also had a 68.

Team Canada Young Pro Squad member Brooke Henderson had a share of ninth place after an opening-round 70.

British Columbia’s Sue Kim carded a 72 Thursday for a share of 28th.

Back for a second straight year at Lake Merced in the San Francisco suburbs, the tournament drew 18 of the top 20 players in the world – and it would have been one more before eighth-ranked Suzann Pettersen withdrew Wednesday because of an ailing shoulder.

Paula Creamer was at risk of missing the cut after a 10-over 82. She had four bogeys and a pair of double bogeys.

TORONTO — Team Canada Young Pro Squad member Brooke Henderson can add another award to her already extensive trophy case, as she was named the Syl Apps Ontario Athlete of the Year Award recipient by the Ontario Sports Hall of Fame.

The Hall announced their 2015 inductees and award winners April 22. Henderson, a Smiths Falls, Ont., native had a terrific 2014 season as an amateur before turning professional in December.  She will be presented the award at the 20^th annual Ontario Sports Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony, which will be held Sept. 24 in Toronto.

The Syl Apps Ontario Athlete of the Year Award was unveiled in 1998 and is named after former Toronto Maple Leafs captain and Olympic pole-vaulter Syl Apps.

As the 2014 winner, Henderson is the first female golfer to win the award and only the second female to take the prize. It is the fourth time an Ontario golfer has earned the honour as Mike Weir was the 1999, 2000 and 2003 recipient of the honour. At just 17-years-old, Henderson is also the youngest winner of the award.

Henderson had an impressive 2014 where she won the Ontario Women’s Amateur Championship, Porter Cup, Scott Robertson Memorial Tournament, South Atlantic Ladies Amateur, Canadian Women’s Tour – Ontario, Espirito Santo Trophy and finished runner up at the U.S. Women’s Amateur. Henderson was also the number one ranked amateur in the world before turning professional.

Since turning pro, Henderson has already captured two Sun Coast Series championships and played in numerous LPGA and Symetra Tour tournaments.

The Syl Apps Ontario Athlete of the Year Award is voted on by Ontario-based sports writers, broadcasters/personalities (with at least 10 years experience covering sports in the province), members of the Ontario Sports Hall of Fame Board of Directors and the Hall’s Advisory Board. Points are awarded on a five, three and one point structure with voters asked to name their top three athletic performers on their ballot.

To be eligible for the Award, athletes must be Ontario-born or Ontario-based and made an outstanding and memorable contribution to Ontario sports during the previous calendar year.

Tiger Woods will visit Asia from April 24 – 26 to help stoke local interest in the sport of golf and inspire athletes in China and Japan.

The 14-time Major champion will make his first stop in Shanghai on April 24 before he travels to Tokyo on April 26.

“When Tiger visited Asia in 2011, his presence was absolutely electric,” said Marc Patrick, VP Global Marketing of Nike Golf. “He really connected with the young athletes and inspired so many golf enthusiasts. We believe this generated tremendous energy around the sport of golf in Asia .We look forward to continued success again this year.”

During the visit, Woods will conduct golf clinics and interact with young athletes, while sharing his insights, knowledge and love of the game with golf fans, athletes and members of the media.

SHANGHAI – Most golfers at the Volvo China Open had trouble keeping their approach shots from flying off the firm greens at Tomson Golf Course on Thursday.

For a trio of European Tour veterans playing some of their best golf at the moment, the difficult conditions didn’t pose too much of a problem.

Michael Hendry, Bradley Dredge and David Howell all shot a 4-under 68 to top the crowded leaderboard after a first round in which low scores proved difficult to post.

Hendry and Dredge were the only golfers to complete bogey-free rounds, while Howell had one bogey to go with five birdies.

“The greens were really firm so the big thing was if you were hitting fairways, you had chances on the par 5s and short irons,” said Dredge, a 41-year-old Welshman. “It was never easy getting the ball close to the hole with slopes on the greens and the firmness, it was quite tricky around there.”

The three were a stroke ahead of defending champion Alexander Levy and Julien Quesne of France and Marcus Fraser of Australia in joint-fourth.

China’s top player, Li Haotong, and Thailand’s Kiradech Aphibarnrat both shot 71 to sit in tie for 14th. Last Sunday, Kiradech beat the 19-year-old Li in a playoff to capture his second Euroepan Tour title at the Shenzhen International.

For Dredge, the new season has brought a return to the European Tour after he lost his card at the end of 2012. He played his way back into form while dealing with injuries and illness and regained his playing privileges with back-to-back runner-up finishes in a two-week span in August.

“It took a while to recover from an operation I had at the back end of last year,” he said. “But I’m fighting fit now and starting to play much better so that bodes well for the rest of the season.”

The 35-year-old Hendry is also playing confidently at the moment after a win last week in the season-opening event on the Japan Tour, which earned him US$215,000 and vouchers worth a year’s supply of rice in Japan.

“I think it’ll take me about a decade to get through,” the New Zealander joked. “It’s a funny game, golf. When you are in form, you’ve got to try to make the most of it because you spend most of the time out of form.”

Howell is looking to build on two top-5 finishes over the past month and a half – he tied for second at the Joburg Open in March and fourth last week in Shenzhen. His last win on the tour came in 2013 at the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship.

The 39-year-old Englishman said that even though he played well last week, the conditions in Shanghai are posing new challenges.

“We knew it was firm in practice and it was hard to work out how difficult it was going to be,” he said. “I drove the ball beautifully today, really found my rhythm on the range and took that onto the course very nicely.”

Li rebounded well from his disappointing near-miss last week to post a solid first-round score. He had been leading by two strokes on the back nine in Shenzhen on Sunday when Kiradech made an eagle on his penultimate hole and then captured the title on the first playoff hole.

“I’m pretty satisfied with my game, especially the last two rounds (in Shenzhen). I couldn’t complain about anything,” Li said through a translator.

Among the other Chinese golfers in the field is Guan Tianlang, who made headlines two years ago when he became the youngest player ever to make the cut at the Masters at the age of 14. Now 16, Guan had a triple-bogey on par-4 11th hole to sit in 76th place after a 75.