Bad Greens Be Damned, The First Round of The LPGA Shanghai Was a Putting Clinic

After seeing some of the crazy photos of the course for this week's Buick LPGA Shanghai, I was pleasantly surprised to see just how well players got off.

Before competition began, the greens at Qizhong Garden Golf Club went viral on golf Twitter, leaving a lot of us wondering exactly how the poor conditions would impact play.

RELATED: LPGA Shanghai Green Conditions Look Pretty...Bad

In a statement given to Golfweek, the Tour responded to the reactions with: "We are aware of the course conditions at the Buick LPGA Shanghai. The golf course superintendent, tournament team and the LPGA rules officials have worked diligently against extreme heat conditions this season in preparation for this week's event. We will continue to monitor the situation and care for the course appropriately throughout the week."

For the most part, the rest of the course appears to be fairly okay, and there's been very little peep about course conditions from the players in pressers.

And with round one complete, it seems like these pros got accustomed to the greens a lot easier than anticipated—the leaderboard is bunched already. More than half of the field recorded under-par rounds (57 out of 82), with leader Arpichaya Yubol, better known on Tour as "Piano," carding an 8-under 64 in the opening round.

It doesn't get more surgical than what Piano did. Her stats for the first round are as follows: 11 out of 14 fairways hit, she missed only one green in regulation, needed only 28 putts, and was one of 12 players who went bogey free. If none of that means anything to you, just know that she played lights-out golf.

After the round, the clubhouse leader gave a little insight on how she felt about her putting, saying, "[I] try to put the ball to get closer to the hole and then made the putt easy. But this green is making like everything possible. Like even long putt, short putt, everything is possible."

I think I'd say the same thing after firing a 64.

But it wasn't just the leader who was playing great golf. There are five players sitting just one shot shy of Yubol at 7-under, including world No.1 Jeeno Thitikul and three-time major winner Minjee Lee.

After a bogey-double bogey start, Thitikul was on a heater, making 10 birdies in 14 holes, the most of any player in the field on Thursday.

Jenny Shin, a 15-year LPGA vet, also had herself a day. She's in the same five-player bunch sitting T-2, but Shin recorded 11 one putts during the first round. Totaling 25 putts, tying for the lowest across the field.

The overall field scoring average for the first round was 70.477, roughly 2-under par. No full putting statistics have been made available yet, but I think it's safe to say that round one was a indeed a bit of a putting clinic.