Inbee Park and Stacy Lewis make progress at Women's British Open
Saturday 5 August 2017 17:02, UK
Inbee Park believes her game is back trending in the right direction after a record-equalling third round at the Ricoh Women’s British Open.
The former world No 1 fired a birdie-free 64 at Kingsbarns, matching the women's course record set by Michelle Wie earlier in the week, to close the gap on leader In-Kyung Kim.
Beginning the day nine strokes off the pace, Park birdied her first two holes and added another at the fifth before posting successive gains from the eighth to reach the turn in 31.
Park birdied the 11th and rolled in a seventh of the day at the par-four 15th, with the 29-year-old completing her blemish-free card with a 15-foot gain at the 17th hole.
"I was not confident with my ball-striking coming into this week," Park said. "I struggled last week and struggled about the last month or so.
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"I've never been to the putting green this week because I was so concentrated on my ball-striking. This morning is the first time I came to this putting green this week.
"Once the confidence from the ball-striking came on, the putts started to roll and just a better mind-set brought me some good putts."
Playing partner Stacy Lewis also made a big move up the leaderboard, mixing nine birdies with two bogeys on her way to a seven-under 65.
Lewis posted three gains in a front-nine 33 with two more after the turn, before cancelling out back-to-back blemishes from the 13th with a run of four consecutive birdies over the closing stretch.
"I really putted pretty poorly the first two days and worked on some things yesterday," Lewis said. "My mum told me I needed to take my putter straighter back. I hate to give her credit, but she was right.
"When the weather is good you have to take advantage of it and I think Inbee and I both knew that, playing these things over the years."
Watch the Ricoh Women's British Open live on Sky Sports Golf. Live coverage from the final round begins on Sunday from 12.30pm.
