MIZUHO AMERICAS OPEN

May 8, 2026

Rina Kawasaki

Mountain Ridge Country Club

Quick Quotes

Q. All right joining us after the second round of the Mizuho Americas Open is Rina Kawasaki. Rina, it's some tough golf out there. Can you just talk a little bit about your experience and what's going well?

RINA KAWASAKI: Yeah, I feel like this course is really, really tough, and I was talking to a lot of the pros and they said that it was like especially the greens and like greenside was hard, so I think I was really relieved to hear that it wasn't just me who was struggling.

This week my shots are good, so like tee-to-green I feel like I'm putting it in the fairway and putting it where I need to be. It's just like it's really hard to recover here once you do hit a bad shot.

So I think, yeah.

Q. Yeah. We're not seeing a ton of low scores across the field, including our LPGA Tour pros. How does it boost your confidence or make you feel like you are in a good position just understanding that you're keeping your mistakes to a minimum out here?

RINA KAWASAKI: Yeah, I feel like when you see on TV you don't really know how the course is. Like you don't know how fast the greens are, how firm they are.

And so just like being able to play the same exact course as the pros at the same time and then shoot maybe like similar scores and have the same struggles, I think it really does boost my confidence even for the future.

When I play hard courses I'm like, okay, it's not just because I'm a junior. It's also like it's just the course and the golf in general is just tough.

Q. Yeah. You mentioned this is why your first time playing at least adjacent to an LPGA Tour event. Talk about if you had any unique experiences this week with caddies, with Tour players, anything different from a normal tournament?

RINA KAWASAKI: Yeah, I feel like you learn a lot more than just playing a regular junior tournament. I played practice rounds with my LPGA mentor and a different pro, and they're so nice. They teach you so, so many things. They don't like try to keep information from you. They tell you like oh, this is where you should hit it, or like when you ask them a question they'll like really answer it in depth with a lot of insight.

So I think it's really cool to be able to experience this and learn so much from it.

Q. Can you tell us who your mentor is?

RINA KAWASAKI: She's Ilhee Lee. Yeah, super nice. Like so nice.

Q. How do you think that having this experience as a whole is going to set you up for the rest of the season on the AJGA?

RINA KAWASAKI: Yeah, I feel like it's something to look back on and maybe have good memories and boost my confidence. Like oh, if I can play like this on like an LPGA course than in my regular junior tournaments I can do this.