Golf-Imada and Points retain early lead at Torrey Pines (Reuters)
January 30, 2010
By Mark Lamport-Stokes
SAN DIEGO, Jan 30 (Reuters) – Overnight pacesetters RyujiImada of Japan and American DA Points retained a share of thelead midway through Saturday’s third round of the San DiegoOpen.
On another glorious day of sunshine at Torrey Pines, Imadamissed the chance to edge a stroke in front when he narrowlyfailed to sink a birdie putt from eight feet at the par-fiveninth.
That left him with an outward nine of even-par 36 to staylevel with Points, who also covered the front nine in level.
Australians Robert Allenby and Marc Leishman were a furthertwo strokes back in a tie for third at nine under with PGA Tourrookie Matt Every.
Tour veteran Allenby had completed 10 holes, Leishman 11 andEvery nine.
Among the big names, three-times major winner Ernie Els wasthree shots off the pace after 13 holes.
Co-leader overnight, Points slipped back with a bogey at thepar-four first where he missed the fairway off the tee and Imadabriefly moved two shots clear after rolling in a five-footbirdie putt at the third.
FIRST BOGEY
However, Imada recorded his first bogey of the week at thepar-four fourth after driving into a fairway bunker and failingto reach the green in two.
Points then regained a share of the lead with Imada at 11under when he knocked in a birdie putt from seven feet at thepar-five sixth and the pair remained deadlocked at the turn..
Els moved to within two of the lead after covering the frontnine in a sizzling four-under 32 but then slid back withsuccessive bogeys from the par-three 11th where he three-putted.
Three-times winner Mickelson closed to within three of thelead when he rammed in a five-footer to birdie the sixth but hetumbled backwards after losing a ball at the par-four seventh.
The American left-hander pushed his tee shot there well leftand eventually had to declare his ball lost after it ended up ina eucalyptus tree.
A spectator climbed up the tree in a bid to identify wherethe ball was located, but, when that failed, Mickelson trudgedback to the tee to hit his third shot en route to an uglydouble-bogey six. (Editing by Pritha Sarkar; To query or comment on this storyemail sportsfeedback@thomsonreuters.com)
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