TIGER Woods was three strokes off the lead when lightning halted play more than halfway through the third round at the CA Championship in Miami.
Woods started the day one stroke behind halfway leader Geoff Ogilvy, and given his recent form, it seemed almost a formality that he would quickly charge to the front.
However, on a languid morning at the Doral Resort's Blue Monster, Woods struggl
ed uncharacteristically with his putter in the early going.
Ogilvy, the 2006 United States Open champion, led at 14 under, one stroke ahead of fellow Australian Adam Scott, with Woods equal third at 11 under.
The three front-runners had completed 11 holes when the horn sounded to stop play, with only 24 players having completed the round.
Joining Woods at 11 under were Fiji's Vijay Singh (16 holes) and South African Tim Clark (15 holes), while Graeme Storm headed an otherwise disappointing British challenge at 10 under through 15 holes.
Woods, seeking to continue his run of seven consecutive tournament wins, missed a short birdie putt at the first hole and an even shorter par putt at the second. Scott, however, started like a house on fire with a 15-foot eagle at the par-five first, followed by a birdie at the third to pull level with Ogilvy, before taking the lead two holes later.
A stiff breeze is the only defence this course has, but there was hardly a puff of wind at the start of play, so it was little surprise that the world's best players were plundering birdies and eagles.
Woods was out-of-sorts from the very start, pulling his drive at the first, but he found his path to the green unobstructed and managed to get an iron to the back fringe, 50 feet from the hole.
He putted down to five feet then, shockingly, his next putt lipped out.
Even worse followed as he missed from inside four feet at the next. He had only one birdie on the front nine, a three-footer at the par-four seventh.
Scott and Ogilvy, meanwhile, vied for the lead, with Ogilvy pulling into a tie with a birdie at the seventh, before going ahead with another birdie at the par-three ninth.
South African Hennie Otto has a five-stroke lead with one round to play in the Madeira Islands Open. Chasing his first victory on the circuit and not even the holder of a Tour card at the moment, the 31-year-old yesterday added a third successive 67 for a 15-under-par total.
Scotland's Alastair Forsyth, whose only victory came in the 2002 Malaysian Open, shot 66 to improve from seventh to second.
Londoner Gary Clark's best-of-the-week 64 sent him charging through the field from 19th to third. But pre-tournament favourite Bradley Dredge is only 20th and 13 adrift.
Otto is best known to European golf fans for two things – leading the Open and throwing his clubs in a river. His "river" tantrum came in 2001 after he missed the cut in the South African Masters. He was so disgusted by a round of 80 that he broke every one of his clubs and then chucked them off a bridge.
Otto lost his Tour card at the end of the 2004 season – but with all the stars away this week, his 141st place on last year's Order of Merit was good enough to get him into the Madeira field.
Scottish exile Ross Bain shares the lead heading into the final round of the Asian Tour International at the Pattana resort in Thailand. But there was last-hole misery for Craigielaw's Lloyd Saltman, as he missed the halfway cut by a single shot in the weather-delayed event.
Dubai-based Bain, the top Scot in last year's Open at Carnoustie, returned early in the morning to complete his second round and birdied four of his last five holes in a course-record 10-under 62.
He then continued his rampaging run up the field with a five-under 67 in the afternoon for a 17-under 199 to sit in a tie for the lead with Korean teenager Noh Seung-yul.
The full article contains 704 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
