Los Angeles (AFP) – Clubhouse leader Aaron Baddeley wasn’t the only player making inroads on Jhonattan Vegas’s big lead in the Barbasol Championship when third-round action was halted.
Venezuela’s Vegas had seized a six-shot lead thanks to a scintillating 60 on Friday on the Robert Trent Jones Trail Grand National in Alabama.
But on a day disrupted by multiple weather delays Australia’s Baddeley — who started the day 11 off the lead — had narrowed the gap to three strokes with a third-round 64 for a 13-under total of 200.
Baddeley’s seven-under effort included nine birdies. He chipped in from behind the green at the 18th for his third straight birdie, capping a round that equalled his lowest on the PGA Tour this season.
“I played really nice all day,” said Baddeley, who claimed the most recent of his three US tour titles in Los Angeles in 2011. “I hit 15 greens or something like that. To chip in on the last was a little bonus. I played really solid all day.”
David Toms, who started the day eight shots behind Vegas, had closed within three with four to play when play was suspended.
The 49-year-old American, owner of 13 US tour titles, birdied three of his first five holes and after a bogey at the eighth added birdies at 11 and 12.
Vegas was one-over through 13 holes when play was halted for the day.
The Venezuelan opened the third round with five straight pars before bogeys at the sixth and eighth. He rebounded with a birdie at the ninth, dropped a shot at 11 and had just pulled a stroke back with a birdie on 13 when play was suspended.
Vegas will have 23 holes to play Sunday as he looks to hold on to the lead that he’s held at least a share of throughout the first three rounds.
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