Shrugging off a couple of rain delays, Annika Sorenstam shot an 8-under 64 -- her third straight round in the 60s -- to move to the top of the leaderboard in the Florida's Natural Charity Championship on Saturday.
"It's been a long day. A very long day," said Sorenstam, who finished up in the next-to-last group just as the sun was dipping below the trees at the Eagle's Landing Country Club south of Atlanta. "But I'm very happy with my score. I thought I played some good golf."
A year ago, Sorenstam had essentially wrapped up this tournament by the end of the third round, taking a 10-stroke lead to Sunday and winning by the same margin. This time, she went into the final 18 holes with a one-stroke cushion over 36-hole leader Sung Ah Yim, who posted a bogey-free 68.
"It's a little bit of a different situation than last year," Sorenstam said. "But having said that, I'm in great shape for tomorrow. I'm happy with the way I'm playing. I'm hitting a lot of fairways and greens, and I'm putting well."
Indeed, it would be a major surprise if she doesn't hang on to the lead.
Sorenstam is the only two-time winner of this event, and now she has a chance to be the first to win it back-to-back. She's homing in on her second US LPGA Tour win of the year and 68th of her Hall of Fame career.
Contrast that with Yim, a 22-year-old South Korean who's in just her second year on the US tour and has never finished higher than third. And what about the rest of the field? No one else was within five shots of Sorenstam's 17-under total of 199.
"She's really better than me," Yim acknowledged. "But I'm not scared. I've just got to hit it straight. Just do it."
The start of the third round was delayed 45 minutes by rain, and play was halted again for nearly 90 minutes while thunderstorms moved through the area. The rest of the round was played in mostly sunny conditions, though the final groups barely had enough daylight to finish up.
"The last four holes, we were playing straight into the sun and straight into the wind," Sorenstam said. "I was looking at the clock, hoping, wondering, `Can we finish today?' It would have been quite a tough day [Sunday] if we couldn't finish, have to get up early, finish and then start over."
After teeing off late, Sorenstam was forced back to the clubhouse after playing a couple of holes. But she got things rolling with four straight birdies to finish the front nine, sinking three testy putts from 9 to 12 feet.
Sorenstam scrambled at the end for the lead. She hit two bunkers on No. 17, but managed to sink a 12-foot putt to save par. Then, going for the green with her second shot at the par-5 18th, her ball clipped an oak tree overhanging the fairway and fell to the ground along with a limb.
Stuart Appleby remained in position to join Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson as the only two-time winners on the US PGA Tour this year, shooting a 3-under 69 to take a two-stroke lead.
Appleby had five birdies in his third straight sub-70 round at The Tournament Course at Redstone to finish at 14 under. The Australian bogeyed the difficult 18th, a hole he birdied at the end of a 66 in the first round.
Sweden's Mathias Gronberg birdied the 18th for a 67 and a 12-under total. Jerry Smith (69) and Bob Estes (66) were four shots back at 10 under.
"There's a lot of golf, 25 percent of the tournament still left out there," Appleby said. "I might be leading -- but that only means that I'm leading."
He won the season-opening Mercedes Championships at Kapalua for the third straight year and felt a similar level of confidence this week.
"There's a feeling. It's a confident feeling that you like the way your game feels," Appleby said. "Most of the time, all the Kapaluas, I've come in, I've liked the way I've played and putted."
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