Teresa Lu (盧曉晴) of Taiwan, who’s been playing on the JLPGA Tour, will come back to this new 2013 event, KENDA Tires TLPGA Open presented by Kenda Rubber Ind., Co., Ltd., starting on Jul 24. The event will be played at the Taipei Golf Club, Linkou, Taipei, through three rounds, with total purse of NT$3 million and NT$600,000 going to the winner.

For the JLPGA no.14 Teresa Lu, this week’s event is more than just another home tournament on the schedule. Lu became one of the biggest sponsored athletes by Kenda since 2008. Posters and huge advertisement boards with her face on are put up everywhere in the town where Kenda Rubber sets their headquarter, Yuanlin, Changhua.

“Thanks to Kenda, I get free Taiwanese meatballs (Changhua local specialty) every time I’m in Changhua,” said Lu.

The 25-year old Lu had already seven top ten finishes in sixteen events on the JLPGA Tour this season, ranked as high as 14th currently. But she’s expected to be challenged on Friday by fellow JLPGA player Wei Yun-Jye (魏筠潔), who’s at JLPGA no.44, TLPGA no.3 Shih Huei Ju (石惠如), and Korea’s Ye Na Chung, who finished runner-up at the Chung Cheng Ladies Open last week.

Lu will start tomorrow in the final group at 9:30 am with Chung and Liu Yi-Chen (Babe) (劉依貞), the Chung Cheng Heritage Tour winner and a Linkou native.

Last week’s Chung Cheng Ladies Open winner, 15-year-old amateur Cheng Ssu-Chia (程思嘉), had to skip this week, though, who will be competing for Chinese Taipei at the same time in the 13th Neighbors Trophy Team Championship held in Japan.

Typhoon Soulik struck Linkou a fortnight ago, and heavy rains poured down in the Taipei Golf Club. Club Chairman Huang Yun-Sheng (黃雲生) guaranteed a course back in perfect playing conditions, “we’ve been working at our hardest with all the staff and machines working around the clock to get the course back in shape, if not better, for all the players to give us a wonderful golf feast.”

There will be a cut in this week’s event after second round finishes, and only top 50 and ties will continue on in the final round.