Sport - Sports : General

Lavery extends her lead

Chennai: Lavery Kumar shot a one-over 73 in the third round of the Madras ladies golf championships on Thursday, extending her lead over the second-placed Neha Tripathi to seven strokes in the open category of the gold division.

Neha and third-placed Shruti Khanna shot 76 each to total 231 and 232 respectively.

This was Lavery’s best round of the open so far, her consistency over 18 holes a stark contrast to the Jekyll-and-Hyde rounds her two closest pursuers endured.

Her serenely confident performance was capped by a birdie on the final hole, made possible by a lofted approach shot from the middle of the fairway that stopped dead a couple of yards from the pin.

Halfway through the round, Shruti looked in ominous form, birdies on the first, second and fourth holes suggesting a threat to Lavery’s lead. It diminished with a double bogey on the seventh, caused by an overhit chip out of a bunker, and evaporated in the back nine, where she shot five-over. Neha took three strokes to extricate the ball from a possessive bunker halfway to the pin on the par-five sixth, and the wound opened by the ensuing triple-bogey was liberally salted by Lavery and Shruti, who sunk birdies.

She recovered brilliantly on the back nine, clean drives smacked long and into the middle of the 10th and 16th fairways setting up crucial birdies to put her back in second.

The results: After three rounds: Gold Division: Open (gross scores): 1. Lavery Kumar (Del) 224; 2. Neha Tripathi (Kol) 231; 3. Shruti Khanna (Del) 232; Handicap (nett scores): 1. Lavery 212; 2. Akriti Singh (Pun) 213. Silver: Open: 1. Prema Ramraj (Che) 265; 2. Arya Tikenekar (Pune) 271; 3. S. Lakshmi (Che) 272; Handicap: 1. Lakshmi 218; Prema 220. Bronze: Winners (three rounds only): Open: 1. Bela Phadke (Pune) 321; 2. Susie Kurien (Chen) 324; Handicap: 1. Bela 234; 2. Susie 246. — Sports Reporter

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