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Congratulations then to Miyū Yamashita, commiserations to Charley Hull, and thanks to you for reading this blog. Here’s how the top of the leaderboard looks after it all came down in Porthcawl. See you for the Ryder Cup next month? OK, it’s a date!
-11: Miyū Yamashita
-9: Charley Hull, Minami Katsu
-7: Rio Takeda, Kim A-lim
-6: Hsu Wei-ling, Megan Khang
-4: Paula Martin Sampedro (a), Lottie Woad, Steph Kyriacou
-3: Mao Saigo, Andrea Lee
-2: Pajaree Anannarukarn, Lauren Coughlin, Kim Sei-young, Minjee Lee, Kim Hyojoo, Chiara Tamburlini
-1: Linn Grant, Yan Liu, Mimi Rhodes, Georgia Hall
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Charley Hull speaks to Sky. “I felt I was so under control … on 16 I hit a really nice tee shot with my rescue wood … the wind was howling off the left and I hit it pure … it just didn’t move a yard through the air … so I went in the bunker … I hit a lay-up shot but was pumped … I gave it a good run … there’s always next year! … I feel pretty good … I played pretty decent all week … I came in not confident … I’m pretty proud of myself.”
Meanwhile it turns out that Hull is only second on the list of players with multiple runners-up finishes in the majors without a win. She’s on four, alongside Judy Rankin, Rosie Jones and Ruth Jessen, but behind Ayako Okamoto, who suffered like this on six occasions.
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… and so Miyū Yamashita becomes the second Japanese major winner this year. Her victory at the Women’s Open follows Mao Saigo’s triumph at the Chevron Championship back in May. She’s the sixth Japanese woman to win a major, after Chako Higuchi (1977 LPGA), Hinako Shibuno (2019 Women’s Open), Yuka Saso (2021 and 2024 US Open), Ayaka Furue (2024 Evian) and the aforementioned Mao Saigo. That is not bad company to be keeping.
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Miyū Yamashita, blinking back happy tears, clearly still processing her richly deserved major-championship breakthrough, continues. “The course is obviously very difficult … but in brilliant condition … the amount of support really pushed me to victory so this is for them as well … I’d like to thank everyone … my first win is very special … to celebrate with everyone is amazing … thank you!”
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Then it’s time for Miyū Yamashita – 24 years old yesterday, so happy birthday! – to lift the trophy. All smiles. So happy! Her first interview as a major champion begins. “To win such a historic tournament in front of all these amazing fans is such an incredible feeling … to have my family around me and have so much support is amazing … very special!”
Trophy time for Miyu Yamashita. Photograph: Cameron Smith/R&A/Getty ImagesShare
Updated at 19.17 BST
Miyū Yamashita checks the numbers on her card, and scribbles her name at the bottom of it. No Roberto-De-Vicenzo-infused errors today, please! Then she makes her way to the trophy presentation. R&A Guy talks for a bit, thanking the folk he has to thank. But then it’s time to announce the results. First up, the Smyth Salver is awarded to Paula Martin Sampedro, the leading amateur with a score of 284. The brilliant young Spaniard, who made five birdies in a row earlier today, bounces up to collect her prize. Lottie Woad won it last year, so great things await!
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Props to Charley Hull, who once again has done so much to inject excitement into a Women’s Open, only to come up short. She’s now finished as runner-up at four majors, a record for someone who hasn’t won any. Surely her time will come. The pain of coming so close again will sting for a while, but once it subsides she’ll be proud: she certainly wasn’t expecting too much coming into this week, after illness and injury. Yes, she’ll be back. Hats off as well to Mimi Rhodes, who made that snooker-loopy ace on the 5th, caroming her ball off Steph Kyriacou’s, the Aussie becoming the first player in golf history to record a hole-in-one (she aced the 8th on Friday) and an assist for someone else’s ace at the same major. Traditionalists needn’t bother arguing the toss, because she did do that, so assists are a new thing now. Congratulations to Mimi and Steph!
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That was a glorious final round by Miyū Yamashita. Out in 33, steady all the way, with only the slightest of wobbles midway along the back nine. Even then, she made two huge par saves, at 13 and 14, to keep things going. Kim A-lim briefly joined her at the top, and Charley Hull launched one of her trademark chases, but each time they got close, Yamashita held her nerve and her position. Just the one dropped shot, on 17, and even that wasn’t too egregious. A thoroughly deserved victory for a player who came so close at last year’s PGA, but has now gone one better.
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Miyū Yamashita wins the 2025 Women’s Open!
Two careful putts, and Miyū Yamashita finishes with a round of 70. She’s the new Women’s Open champion golfer! She raises her arms in victory as her face crumples into joyful tears. Kim A-lim gives her a cuddle … and tips her water bottle down her back while doing so! All in the way of celebration, as her compatriots race onto the green with bottles of champagne, and soak her once again!
-11: Yamashita (F)
-9: Hull (F), Katsu (F)
-7: Takeda (F), AL Kim (F)
Miyu Yamashita of Japan putts on the 18th green to win the AIG Women’s Open 2025 at Royal Porthcawl. Photograph: Charlie Crowhurst/R&A/Getty ImagesShare
Updated at 18.49 BST
Miyū Yamashita whips a graceful wedge into the heart of 18. This is done. Kim A-lim nearly holes out for a valedictory eagle, but tidies up for birdie. A disappointing 73 and it’s easy to forget now, as she finishes at -7, that Kim briefly had co-ownership of the lead earlier this afternoon.
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The thing about Jean Van de Velde was, he didn’t bottle the 1999 Open. Sure, he ballsed it up in the grand style … but it wasn’t for the lack of moxie. He could have nudged his ball up the 18th at Carnoustie, but wanted to win the Open “like D’Artagnan”. Hats off to him for that, the man will forever be one of the great Open heroes.† So hats off also to Miyū Yamashita, who could take a careful iron out of the rough to take some greenside bunkers out of play, but instead lashes a wood for full effect. She tugs it a bit, and is fortunate to miss those aforementioned bunkers. But fortune favours the brave. The ball skips to the left of them, and she’ll have a wedge from light rough to reach the green in regulation.
†: Winning’s not everything. Who still talks about Todd Hamilton?
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Miyū Yamashita isn’t risking the gorse down the right of 18. She favours the left-hand side of the fairway, and while her ball goes into the semi-rough, she’ll take that. Meanwhile up on the green, Minami Katsu makes birdie to finish with a 69. Unless her compatriot Yamashita collapses in the Jean Van de Velde style, she’ll finish in a tie for second with Charley Hull. Three of the top four are from Japan.
-11: Yamashita (17)
-9: Hull (F), Katsu (F)
-7: Takeda (F)
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… and yet this isn’t quite over yet. Miyū Yamashita can’t make her par putt on 17, the ball always breaking low on the right-hand side, and that’s the leader’s first bogey of the day. What a time to make it. Bogey for Kim A-lim.
-11: Yamashita (17)
-9: Hull (F)
-8: Katsu (17)
-7: Takeda (F)
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Charley Hull shoots 69
Charley Hull lobs over the bunker at 18 to ten feet. A chance for a birdie to put pressure on Miyū Yamashita … but her putt is always missing left. Just a par, and she signs for a final round of 69. It promised more. Much more. But those bogeys at 16 and 17 were body blows she had no time to recover from. She ends the week at -9, the new clubhouse leader. She’ll most likely finish second at a major for the fourth time. Nobody has as many runner-up finishes on her CV without actually winning one.
Charley Hull of England acknowledges the crowd on the 18th green. Photograph: Richard Heathcote/R&A/Getty ImagesShare
Updated at 18.49 BST
Now then. Miyū Yamashita is able to take a fairway wood to her ball from the rough down the left of 17. But she doesn’t catch it cleanly, pulling it further left. And though the ball clears a bunker, it nestles in some thick rough a few yards further on. Plenty to think about. So she takes her time before chipping … and swishes a fine wedge out to eight feet. It’s a decent outcome from where she was, but she’s got work to do to save her par. She’s made big putts on 13 and 14 to keep her card intact. Can she make another?
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Charley Hull has to take a shy for the green from the centre of 18. Her ball’s always carving off to the right, and ends up in the most awkward position, at the bottom of a depression behind a greenside bunker, with the pin only just over the back of the sand. Short-sided, with added undulations for extra misery. She walks up the fairway to gentle applause from a disappointed gallery; the player herself tries to put on a brave face but a smile doesn’t last long. By the looks of it, this will be another close-but-no-cigar story for Hull in the majors.
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Updated at 18.16 BST
… so having said that, Yamashita looks a little anxiously after her drive on 17. Her ball disappears into the rough down the left. It’s all about the lie. Meanwhile par on 18 for Rio Takeda, who finishes with a 71 and ends the week at -7. She’s the new clubhouse leader.
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Charley Hull arrives at 18 with very little to lose now. So she opens her shoulders, takes an aggressive line off the tree, and lashes a big boom down the fairway. It’s nearly rendered utterly futile by Miyū Yamashita, who is an inch or so away from curling in a 40-foot left-to-right swinger on 16. This has been such a sensational performance by Yamashita. Just no gap in the armour. No bogeys, that’s for sure.
-12: Yamashita (16)
-9: Hull (17)
-8: Katsu (16)
-7: Takeda (17), AL Kim (16)
-6: Hsu (F)
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Charley Hull leaves her putt from the fringe at the back of 17 ten feet short. The par putt’s always missing to the left, and that’s back-to-back bogeys at exactly the wrong time. Her bid’s almost kaput. An eagle up the last is pretty much necessary now if she’s to apply any real pressure on Miyū Yamashita … but the leader swipes her second at 16 into the green. On in regulation, and she’s yet to make a bogey today. Hull will most likely need Yamashita’s wheels to come clanking off, and that just doesn’t look likely. Meanwhile we have a new clubhouse leader in Hsu Wei-ling, who birdies 18 to sign for a 70 and end her week at -6.
-12: Yamashita (15)
-9: Hull (17)
-8: Katsu (16)
-7: Takeda (17), AL Kim (15)
-6: Hsu (F)
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Updated at 18.09 BST
Miyū Yamashita sends a gentle draw into the par-three 15th. She’s got a 12-foot left-to-right curler to make a birdie that would surely seal the deal, but while her putt looks like dropping, it stops the width of one dimple to the left of the hole. She taps in for par, then swishes a nerveless drive down the middle of 16. Yamashita was driving wild yesterday; whatever she did on the range last night has clearly fixed whatever problem there was.
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Charley Hull most likely needs something coming in, and holes are running out. So it’s not good news that she sends her tee shot at 17 into the rough down the left. She’s got to go for it … and fizzes her second into the heart of the green. It’s another slightly hot one, and the ball bounces off the back, but there’s no swale so she can putt from the fringe.
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… but it’s not costly, because she gathers herself and rolls in the one coming back! From the ridiculous to the sublime! Another fine par save, to follow the as-nails putt on 13. Kim A-lim rolls in her bogey putt, some damage-limitation of her own, but she’s four behind again. And up on 16, Charley Hull leaves her chip up from the back of the green the best part of 20 feet short. Double-bogey disaster awaits … but then she strokes in the gentle left-to-right slider. More damage limitation! Yamashita’s closest rivals going backwards, but it could have been so much worse, and this Open isn’t quite done and dusted yet.
-12: Yamashita (14)
-10: Hull (16)
-8: Katsu (15), AL Kim (14)
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Updated at 17.51 BST
Charley Hull gets a flyer out of the rough, and her ball scampers over the back of the 16th green. She’ll need to get up and down from the swale to restrict the damage to par. Kim A-lim leaves her monster par putt five feet short. And then Miyū Yamashita, putting for birdie from 35 feet, completely misreads her putt. Six feet wide and ten past! What an absurd rush of blood …
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Kim A-lim’s ball has rebounded into filthy rough on 14. She does well to muscle the ball out and into the front of the green, but she’s a long way from the hole, and faces a long two putts just for bogey. Meanwhile over on 16, Charley Hull whips her ball out of the fairway bunker, but sends it into rough down the other side of the hole. She grabs a break, in so much as the grass has been trampled down by the gallery. But she’s now got to get up and down from 100 yards to save her par. While it all whirls around, Miyū Yamashita waits patiently.
Charley Hull plays from a bunker on 16. Photograph: Warren Little/Getty ImagesShare
Updated at 18.51 BST
The wind is behind Miyū Yamashita again. She finds the 14th green in regulation, while Kim A-lim hits the face of a fairway bunker, sending her ball pinging back into deep rough. Charley Hull meanwhile finds fairway sand of her own, down the left of 16. A few minutes ago, Yamashita was in danger of relinquishing her lead. But she scrambled a par, while Kim narrowly missed an eagle putt and Hull left her birdie effort short. And now look.
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Charley Hull gets a bit tentative with the putter again. Her birdie effort on 15 is always missing on the low side, and never reaching. Not the easiest putt, to be fair, with a fair bit of left-to-right break. Meanwhile Steph Kyriacou joins Paula Martin Sampedro and Lottie Woad in the clubhouse lead at -4. She signs for a one-under round of 71, which is no mean feat having triple-bogeyed the opening hole, sending one ball out of bounds and nearly repeating the trick with her next shot. Also the near-miss ace at 5, that turned into an assist for Mimi Rhodes to make one of her own. Ah well, she’ll always have the hole-in-one she made at 8 on Friday.
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Charley Hull on the 144-yard downhill par-three 15th. She’s not made birdie on this hole this week … yet. But despite flirting with the pot bunker to the right, she sets up a chance here, landing her ball ten feet from the flag. Meanwhile back on 12, Kim A-lim nearly drains her eagle putt, but it stays out on the left. She taps in for birdie. Over to the leader Miyū Yamashita, who can only chip up from her downhill lie at the bottom of the swale to 15 feet. But she makes the left-to-right slider. Nerveless. That could have been a three-shot swing between herself and Kim; it’s just one. It could also have cost her sole ownership of the lead; she’s still got it. But this is so close now. Good luck calling it!
-12: Yamashita (13)
-11: Hull (14)
-9: AL Kim (13)
-8: Katsu (13)
-7: Takeda (15)
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Charley Hull applies extra pressure! She whips out of the thick rough down the side of 14, finding the centre of the green. That’s a fine shot to extricate herself from trouble, and set up an outside chance of birdie … which she converts! In goes the 30-footer, and this is really hotting up now!
-12: Yamashita (12)
-11: Hull (14)
-8: Katsu (13), AL Kim (12)
-7: Takeda (15)
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… and these could turn out to be big moments in the race for the title! Because Kim A-lim then creams her fairway wood, shot two, into the heart of 13, and uses the camber to gather her ball towards the flag, back-right. She’ll have a look at eagle from 12 feet or so. That’s a sensational shot, and the pressure’s now on Miyū Yamashita, who faces a job to get up and down for par. A potential big swing could be upcoming.
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Rio Takeda nearly inserts herself into serious contention … but her 15-foot, left-to-right birdie slider lips out. How did that not drop?! She remains at -7. Meanwhile the leader Miyū Yamashita will have some work to do on the par-five 13th. She takes her medicine from the fairway bunker, chipping out sideways, then lashes her third into the green … only for the ball to topple off down a swale to the left. She’s ended up on a downslope as well. That will be super-tricky.
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The new sensation Lottie Woad – one of the pre-tournament favourites despite this being only her second (!) professional start – gets up and down from the wrong side of a greenside bunker on 18. Having been short-sided, that’s a lovely chip with putt to match. She’s not had her best stuff this week, especially struggling with the putter, and yet she ends the day with a 71 and an overall mark of -4. Surrey’s finest joins the amateur Paula Martin Sampedro in the clubhouse lead. She’s a phenomenon. One day, all this will be hers.
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Miyū Yamashita’s problems during yesterday’s 74 were all down to her erratic driving. She looked to have the big stick under control today, but now she sends her tee shot at 13 into a bunker down the left. Problems from the tee for Charley Hull, as well, as she carves her drive into thick muck down the right of 14.
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Charley Hull’s bunker shot on 13: short and tentative. Her subsequent long birdie putt: short and tentative. Miyū Yamashita’s birdie putt on 12: short and tentative. Kim A-lim’s birdie putt on 12: short and tentative. Par, par, par. The nerves beginning to kick in on major-championship Sunday.
-12: Yamashita (12)
-10: Hull (13)
-8: Katsu (12), AL Kim (12)
-7: Takeda (14)
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Charley Hull’s second at the par-five 13th trickles into a bunker 30 yards short of the green. She’s left with a long sand shot coming in. Meanwhile back on the par-three 12th, Miyū Yamashita and Kim A-lim both find the heart of the green, leaving themselves birdie chances from mid-range. Big moments coming up.
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From her position halfway up 11, Miyū Yamashita can see Charley Hull making her birdie up on 12. It doesn’t faze her. She whistles her second into the heart of the green en route to a fuss-free par. It’s par for Kim A-lim as well, but in less conventional style. Kim’s approach finds a deep bunker to the right of the green. She doesn’t get particularly close with her splash out, but makes the six-footer that remains. The ball performs the loop-de-loop, all the way around the rim of the cup before dropping. In. Just. When it disappears, Kim gives the air a little punch. She knows how important that was. She’s hanging on in there at -8, four behind the leader.
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Minami Katsu makes it three birdies in six holes! She walks in a 30-footer on 11, a left-to-right slinger that brings her up to -8. Momentarily on Charley Hull’s shoulder … but then Hull tickles in her own left-to-right birdie putt, and the lead is back to just two!
-12: Yamashita (10)
-10: Hull (12)
-8: Katsu (11), AL Kim (10)
-7: Takeda (12)
-6: Khang (12), A Lee (11)
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… but Charley Hull needs to make some sort of move, before it’s too late, as she can’t depend on Miyū Yamashita to capitulate. Her long game is still on point, and here she is firing another dart at the flag, this time at the par-three 12th. She’ll have another good look at birdie.
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Charley Hull sends another average wedge into the green, this time at 11. She’s pin high but well left of the target, and faces a tricky left-to-right breaker over a ridge. She doesn’t make a particularly good fist of the putt, which is always sailing wide right. She’s left with a tricky six-footer for her par … but she makes it. A crucial putt, that one, because par is slightly disappointing considering where she was chipping into the green from; bogey would have been a disaster. She remains at -9 … and there’s some good news for her back on 10, where Miyū Yamashita and Kim A-lim take turns to miss makeable birdie putts. It’s as you were at the top, albeit with everyone one hole closer to home.
England’s Charley Hull tees off on the 11th. Photograph: Nigel French/PAShare
Updated at 16.52 BST