Shane Lowry hopes to rekindle his Portrush Saturday from 2019 on Birkdale Sunday to spring from the pack and clinch his second Claret Jug.
Lowry has looked solid in his three rounds in the 60s including a third round of 69 which saw him edge upwards to four-under-par. He currently shares eleventh place and is six shots shy of Sam Burns who carded a 65 to reach double figures under par.. His friend Ryan Fox carded a 62 to get to eight-under alongside Si Woo Kim in second and that’s the sort of form the Offaly man needs to produce on Sunday.
“Dermot said to me there when I finished, we’re going to need one of our best days, but at least we have a chance,” he smiled.
“I’d love to be leading (laughter.) I don’t think in an Open Championship on a course like this where you see low scores, high scores, I don’t think — not that you can’t be too far back, but I feel like anyone inside the top 20 will surely feel like — if they have the round of their lives they feel like they can win The Open tomorrow.”
Like the previous two rounds, Lowry made a good start with an early birdie coming on the third as he rolled in from 11-feet. But the run of birdies he was aiming for never came and he began to move in the wrong direction with bogeys on the 10th and 12th.
But Lowry’s Open may not end with the Claret Jug but it has been a week of resilience and perseverance. He produced both again with birdies on 13 and 14 to get to four-under and although he couldn’t birdie the par-5 17th he two-putted from 80-feet for par on the last to at least give himself a sliver of hope.
“I fought well. I made a couple of bogeys there because I felt like I played the front nine beautifully. Hit the ball great. Then a couple of mistakes on the back nine early. I sort of knew obviously 14 and 17 were going to be there for chances, but yeah, they’re still not straightforward.
“I’m hopeful that the leaders don’t go too far away. I obviously saw Ryan Fox, what he did, and that was kind of a target I had in my head. If I can get within touching distance of him, I thought the golf course wasn’t playing easy that the leaders are not going to go too far ahead, but we’ll see how it pans out.”
A golfers biggest battle is usually the one they have with themselves. That’s been the story of Lowry’s summer since the Cognizant Classic collapse. There has been plenty of good golf over the last few months but he hasn’t been able to get out of his own way. So far this week, he has allowed himself to enjoy his golf and he has swung with freedom.
“I’m happy. I’d love to be two or three shots better; don’t get me wrong. I wanted to go out there and shoot 5-under today; that’s what I had in my head.
“But I didn’t. I shot the best score I could, which was 1-under. I’m going to be a few back going into tomorrow, but if I can go out there and get off to a good start on the front nine — I played the front nine well this week. If I can do that tomorrow and hole a few putts as well, I feel like I can get myself there or thereabouts going into the back nine.
“But it’s great; I really enjoyed today. Being out there with Ludvig, he’s playing great golf as well. It was an enjoyable day. It was a grind at times, but I did enjoy it out there. I’m happy that I went out and allowed myself to enjoy it because it’s a tough theatre to be in. The wind is whipping across the course. The course is bouncy. Every bad shot or every average shot is showing up really badly. It’s just a difficult place to play golf.”
Between Lowry and the leaders is a catalogue of household names like Fox, Si Woo Kim, Ludvig Äberg, Bryson DeChambeau and Tommy Fleetwood while he is tied with Scottie Scheffler, Cameron Young, Jon Rahm, Hideki Matsuyama and Xander Schauffele.
“I felt like I did a good job when things were going against me a little bit because I do feel like I probably should have been better than 1-under after nine, and then all of a sudden you make a silly bogey on 10 and 12 and you feel like the day is getting away from you, and what-if sort of creeps into your head.
“I thought I did a good job of staying in my own lane and keeping going on the back nine.”
Meanwhile, the pantomime villain DeChambeau bogeyed the last for a 69 and a six-under total which leaves him four adrift.
DeChambeau was whisked from scoring to the championship office and back to scoring before heading to the driving range after he once again shunned the media.
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