Defending champ Brooke Henderson 4 shots back at season-opening Tournament of Champions

Ayaka Furue of Japan did not see any signs of a fast start coming until she opened her 2024 LPGA Tour season on Thursday with a red-hot performance.

Furue made seven birdies in a round 7-under 65, giving her a two-shot lead in the Hilton Grand Vacations Tournament of Champions at Lake Nona in Orlando, Fla.

Defending champion Brooke Henderson of Smiths Falls, Ont., was part of a group tied for sixth at 3 under.

Henderson won last year's tournament by four shots, going wire-to-wire for her 13th LPGA victory. After jumping out to an opening win a year ago, Henderson did not win again in 2023, and is looking to get off to a fast start.

WATCH l Henderson opens title defence in Orlando:

Furue, 23, who captured the Ladies Scottish Open in 2022 for her first LPGA title, is making her second start at the LPGA's season opener for winners each of the last two years. She broke from a pack late in her round with birdies on the closing two holes at Lake Nona, the Tom Fazio design that hosted the first Solheim Cup in 1990.

An eight-time winner on the Japan LPGA and that circuit's 2021 Player of the Year, Furue was steady throughout to start her third LPGA season, finishing without a bogey on her card.

She finished two shots clear of Sweden's Maja Stark, who tied for second at this tournament last year; and Mexico's Gaby Lopez, a past champion of the TOC.

Lopez started off on the back nine and birdied six of her first eight holes. Her December was not spent practicing, but instead on a three-week honeymoon that took her around the globe, including experiences on safari in South Africa and up close to the pyramids of Egypt.

She had few expectations other than to start slowly, but when she stuffed a 7-iron close at her fourth hole,