South Korean Jiyai Shin carded the low round of the week to shoot up the leaderboard and into a tie for first at the Fir Hills Seri Pak Championship in Palos Verdes Estates, Calif., on Saturday.
Shin, who began the third round in a tie for 33rd, shot an 8-under 63 to join Alison Lee on top heading into Sunday’s final round. Lee shot 68 on Saturday. The pair sit at 9-under 204, two shots ahead of a pack of four golfers.
Shin strung together five straight birdies on the front nine and finished her round with birdies on the three of the last four holes. She turned in a clean card and her 63 was one shot off matching the course record.
“Actually the setting is not for the long golfer, so we need it very consistent,” Shin said. “But, you know, this wind (made it) very hard (for) calculating today. That’s why I talked a lot with my caddie about the wind direction and the numbers, too.”
Lee, meanwhile, carded five birdies and two bogeys on the front nine alone. She would finish with six birdies against three bogeys. Lee is searching for her first win on tour.
“I was in a pretty negative mindset coming into today. I saw the forecast and I saw the wind. I saw how much it’s going to be blowing as the day went on. I definitely had a really negative mindset and I said, ‘oh, my gosh, I’m going to play terrible. It’s so windy, not going to be fun out there,'” said Lee, who is making her 181st total start on Tour. “Yeah, obviously making birdies and shooting under par when it’s like this is fun. So I definitely had a pretty good time out there.”
Tour rookies Gabriela Ruffels of Australia and Malia Nam, as well as major champions Ruoning Yin of China and Nelly Korda, are tied for third two strokes back at 7 under.
Another group of five golfers are within striking distance three shots back in a tie for seventh.
–Field Level Media
