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Tiger briefly leads at Royal St. George's

Tiger Woods eyes the line of a putt on the third day of the British Open at Royal St George's in Sandwich, England, on Saturday. PHOTO: REUTERS

The fist-pumping celebration came early, after a brilliant sand shot that rolled into the hole for his second eagle in seven holes. Tiger Woods was suddenly leading the British Open, and excited fans swarmed to get a glimpse of what was surely going to be a historic charge.

A birdie on the ninth hole gave Woods a 31 on the front nine, and he walked quickly through the cheering crowd to the 10th tee clearly in command.

A couple of bad bounces and one miserable drive later, though, Woods stumbled home with a 3-over-par back nine that did more than just spoil the moment for a lot of sun-baked British golf fans.

Now Woods enters Sunday's final round two shots back and needing to do something he has never done in his otherwise remarkable career -- come from behind over the last 18 holes to win a major championship.

"I've won eight a different way, so maybe I can win one this way," Woods said.

Don't inscribe his name on the claret jug quite yet.

Woods is in a mini-major slump of sorts and hasn't won one of golf's premier four events since last year's US Open. Two shots in front of him is Thomas Bjorn, who proved two years ago in Dubai that he can beat the world's best player in a showdown.

Around Woods is a gaggle of players who refused to fall off a leaderboard filled with names such as Davis Love III, Vijay Singh, Sergio Garcia and Kenny Perry. In all, 12 players are within four shots of the lead, and even Woods expects it to take awhile to sort them all out in the final round at Royal St. George's.

"You figure most of the guys are going to get off to pretty good starts," Woods said. "And it's probably going to weed itself out on the back nine. At least put yourself in position so you have a chance."

A chance for Woods is what some other players fear.

"I expect, like everybody else, that Tiger is going to go out and play his best game tomorrow and win this golf tournament," Bjorn said. "That's what he wants to do, and we all know when he's in that position he's very, very dangerous."

For a time on a day so unseasonably warm on the English Channel that spectators were shedding their shirts, it looked like Woods would do more than simply get in the mix.

He toyed with the longer holes that troubled so many other players, making eagles on the two front nine par-5s and nearly adding a third on the 14th hole.

But a 6-iron that bounced off the green on the 11th hole and a drive that kicked into the rough on the 17th hole cost him two bogeys. A drive he pulled into the deep rough on 15 also took a toll. After playing the front nine without a bogey, he made four coming in, allowing Bjorn and Love to pass him along the way.

"Overall I'm very pleased with the way I played today. You know you're going to get some quirky bounces on this golf course. Some of the bounces also went my way today," Woods said.

One came on the seventh hole, where Woods hacked out of the rough with his second shot into the right greenside bunker. The ball barely trickled in, forcing Woods to have to take a steep angle to avoid hitting the side of the bunker on his downswing. Woods was just trying to get the ball somewhere on the green where he could have a reasonable putt at birdie. He splashed the shot and the ball bounced twice before running about 15 feet straight into the hole.

Woods leaned back and raised both hands in the air in triumph, striding from the bunker pumping his right fist in celebration as the normally reserved crowd roared.

"It wasn't a shot that I was trying to get close, I was just trying to get the ball up on top somehow," Woods said. "And it went into the hole, which was a bonus. It's not a shot you try to hole."

The shot gave Woods the lead for the first time all week, and he ran a 40-footer up the hill and in on the ninth hole for a birdie that got him to 5 under for the day.

Such shots also helped Woods shake off some other bounces that everyone who has played the mounded fairways of Royal St. George's has seen plenty of.

"It's tough, man. When you play most tournaments, you hit a tee shot ... and if you hit it down the middle you pick up the tee and don't worry about it," Woods said. "Here you worry about it."

Other players figure to spend Saturday night worrying about Woods, even though he has gone four major championships without winning -- a streak that would have been unthinkable only a year ago. And, while Bjorn has beaten him head-to-head before, this is the British Open, not the Dubai Classic. No one knows it better than the third-round leader.

"This is a major championship. This is different. He's got a few more experiences walking out there on Sunday in majors," Bjorn said. "When I went head-to-head with him, I won my share of golf tournaments and I knew how to perform under those circumstances. But going out there tomorrow there's a couple of guys out there that know how to win majors. I don't."
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