Women's British Open - 3rd Round

Yani Tseng still leads by four shots as she enters the final round of the Women's British Open.  Katherine Hull is in second place at -8, In-Kyung Kim is third at -6, Brittany Lincicome is fourth at -5 and five other players are tied for fifth at -4.

Tseng started with a four-shot lead and played steady all day.  She began with 12 straight pars which gave her pursuers an opening - of which no one took full advantage.  Cristie Kerr birdied 9 from 12 feet to draw within two at -6 but lost her putting stroke on the back nine.  Three par misses from less than eight feet and a three-foot birdie miss at 17 left Kerr in the tie for fifth.  Inky got within three when she dropped a 15-footer at 16 but a poor tee shot at 17 cost her a bogey at the par-5 17^th.  Kim eagled 18 from 20 feet to climb into solo third place.  Hull made the best run of the day with five straight birdies to close out a 66, which at the time brought her to within one shot.  In the middle of Katherine's run, Yani got going.  She bombed one in from 40 feet at 13 to go -9 and rolled in a 10-footer at 15 to reach double-digits.  Yani missed a great opportunity at 17 when she couldn't convert from four feet but faced with 15 feet for eagle at the final hole, she canned it.

Lincicome stayed within reach all day but only got to -5 when she birdied the two closing par-5s.  Hee Kyung Seo did the same while Momoko Ueda birdied three of the last five, both finishing at -4 with Kerr and Christina Kim, who eagled 18 to play the last five in -4.  Joining that foursome in the tie for fifth is Suzann Pettersen.  Suzann birdied 14 from 15 feet to reach -4 but like Inky found trouble on 17 and couldn't save par.  A seven-foot eagle try at 18 went by the wayside.  Her fate was better than some - Jiyai Shin found the gorse bushes at 11 and took a quadruple-bogey 8.  She got all four shots back by the end but the ten-shot deficit will be too much to overcome.  Juli Inkster and Sun Young Yoo, starting the day in the Top 5, shot themselves out with 76 and 78 respecitively.  Anne-Lise Caudal's 75 knocked her out of the Top 10 down to T17.  Morgan Pressel went out early and posted the best round of the week so far, a 65 despite opening with two bogeys.  Morgan played the final six holes in -6 and is currently T10 at -3 with Na Yeon Choi, who posted a 69.

As the day went on, the conditions deteriorated.  When ESPN went to air, the sun was shining with only about a 10mph breeze.  By the time the last groups were hitting 18, the rain was falling steady and the wind was into the 20s.  Tomorrow's forecast is calling for 65 degrees and a 30% chance of showers with wind around 12mph.  If today's results were any indication, it would have to be blowing a hurricane to knock Yani Tseng off her perch.  She's not known as a front-runner but she's definitely known as a major champion.  I expect her to get her third one tomorrow.