For the first time in Masters history, two players got to double digit under par after 36 holes and, with the weather rolling in, tournament officials decided to run a two-tee start in three-balls for the third round in an attempt to get as much golf played as possible.
It was never going to be a birdie-fest with the course playing extremely long and it favoured the early leaders, Rahm and Koepka as they looked to protect as best they could, rather than attack the course.
And so it proved. Koepka’s carded five pars and one birdie to Rahm’s one birdie, two bogeys and three pars haul and he had extended his lead to four shots when the claxon went to sound the suspension of play for the remainder of the day.
The surprise in the top match was Amateur Sam Bennett who no-one expected to be the low man in his group from the first two days that included Max Homa and defending champion Scottie Scheffler. Bennett however, silenced the doubters and was only four shots off the top spot at the start of the third round.
Unfortunately for the Texas A&M player he isn’t a long hitter and it really showed as he bogeyed the first two holes before steadying the ship with four birdies on the bounce from the 3rd.
“Yeah, it was cold. Teeing off, it was chilly. Hole 1, I think we all had 190 in, and then it started really picking up when we were about hole 3. So it was tough. I mean, hole 5 was playing like a par-5.
“I’ll start off. I kind of toe banged my drive on 1 and got a little greedy on 2 and tried to take a little off and hit loft.”
And as for tomorrow, what is the only amateur left in the field hoping for? Well it seems he’s just like the rest of us: “Hopefully the weather. I think the weather tomorrow looks fine, but I’m just going to try to have fun.”
“It’s sunny, and the course is going to be soft. So I think it’s going to be gettable. I’m guessing we’re going to still have to play it down since we started playing it down, which might be a little tough. I’m sure there’s going to be some mud balls out there.
The weather which stereotypically when it’s wet is said to suit us Irish didn’t quite do that this time around as Shane Lowry had a bit of a rollercoaster round underway before the suspension with three bogeys, one birdie and five pars on the card and he’ll likely be thankful for the stoppage with his next shot being a putt from the front of the 10th green which was starting to show signs of puddles as he got to it.
Similarly Seamus Power. He recorded two bogeys and one birdie to go with his 6 pars and he finds himself in T40 place as the days play came to a conclusion.
The big winners from Saturday though are undoubtedly Koepka and Rahm. They have distanced themselves even more from the chasing pack with Bennett their nearest challenger on 6-under before Patrick Cantlay & Matt Fitzpatrick who were both 3-under for the day and both on 5-under par in T4 position.
Scottie Scheffler was another decent mover and is 2-under for the day and 3-under overall in T14, while Sungjae Im also made the most of the weather to shoot 3-under par for the seven holes to move up to T28.
Koepka, Rahm and Bennett will resume from the 7th hole tomorrow in what are expected to be much more favourable conditions with cold temperatures but no rain forecast.
Play will resume on Sunday at 8:30am local time (1:30 Irish) to complete the third round with the final round getting underway at 12:30pm local time off both the 1st and 10th tees in two-balls.
Leave a comment