South Africa’s Lee-Anne Pace fired a three-under-par 68 on Saturday to match Laura Diaz for the lead after the third round of the Marathon Classic and boost her bid to claim a first LPGA title.
Pace stood on 11-under 202 after 54 holes at Highland Meadows, level atop the leaderboard with US veteran Diaz, who fired a 71 in her quest to notch her first LPGA victory since 2002.
South Korean Ryu So-Yyeon and 20-year-old Jaye Marie Green of the US shared third on 203, with New Zealand’s Lydia Ko fifth on 204.
Photo: AFP
Pace, an eight-time winner on the Ladies European Tour, hopes a strong showing will help her jump to the US tour.
“I definitely want to be in America. Hopefully this week will help me get here full time,” Pace said. “I’m very confident. I felt so relaxed today. It came naturally.”
Pace birdied the third and ninth holes, but stumbled with bogeys at 11 and 12. However, she responded with birdies at the par-four 13th and par-three 14th, and another at the par-five 17th.
Photo: AFP
“I like the greens,” Pace said. “They are quite receptive to my shots. I’m confident about my iron play. I’m hitting it in there very well, hitting really good.”
Diaz, who led when the day began, birdied the third hole, but followed with a double-bogey at the fourth. On the par-four ninth, Diaz drove the ball eight feet beyond the cup and made the eagle putt, but took a bogey at 12.
Green, whose teaching-pro father serves as her caddie, fired a 63.
“I actually dyed my hair last night. I don’t know if that had anything to do with it,” the brunette said.
Green opened with a birdie, added another at the par-three sixth and closed the front nine with back-to-back birdies.
After a birdie at the 12th, Green took her lone bogey of the round at 14, then responded with four birides in a row and closed with par at the par-five 18th, needing only 25 putts to finish off the day’s low round.
“I’m just going to hit driver on every hole tomorrow and go for everything,” Green said. “I’m not going to think about it.”
Green said that she made a return to basics in recent weeks after her efforts to pattern her game after US star Michelle Wie and world No. 1 Stacy Lewis failed to pay off.
“I’m trying to get back to what ‘Old Jaye’ would have done,” she said. “I was just trying to change my swing to be like Michelle Wie and putt like Stacy Lewis, and I was changing everything. I was changing who I was. It wasn’t me. I didn’t know how to be someone I’m not.”
Ryu ran off three birdies in a row, finishing at the par-five 17th, to fire a 68 and join Green one off the pace in yesterday’s penultimate group.
Ko birdied the par-five 17th and 18th to close within two of the leaders.
Taiwan’s Candie Kung hit a third-round 69 to move into a share of 12th place on 206.
Additional reporting by staff writer
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