ATLANTA — Two years after Henrik Stenson sailed to victory at the Tour Championship, he has another comfortable lead after 36 holes at East Lake and Jordan Spieth is chasing him. ADVERTISING ATLANTA — Two years after Henrik Stenson sailed
ATLANTA — Two years after Henrik Stenson sailed to victory at the Tour Championship, he has another comfortable lead after 36 holes at East Lake and Jordan Spieth is chasing him.
Back then, Spieth was a 20-year-old rookie.
Now he’s the Masters and U.S. Open champion, and he found a spark in a steady drizzle Friday.
Stenson overcame a few mistakes off the tee and was solid on the back nine for a 2-under 68, stretching his lead to three shots over Spieth going into the weekend and moving closer to his first win of the year — and a $10 million bonus for claiming the FedEx Cup.
Stenson had his sixth straight round under par at East Lake, a course where the Swede has led after every round he has played. He was at 9-under 131.
Spieth has made only one bogey over two rounds, and a pair of par saves on consecutive holes on the front nine felt just as valuable as his four birdies in a round of 66. The average score was 71.6 on a wet day that yielded only four rounds under par.
Spieth went from the right rough to the left rough on No. 5 and still had 60 yards left and a tree in front of him. He took a risk going through the tree to 6 feet for par, and then rolled in a 20-foot par putt for a bunker save on the par-3 sixth.
Paul Casey made bogey from the bunker on the 18th for a 70 and was four shots behind, while British Open champion Zach Johnson birdied three of his last four holes to overcome a double bogey on the par-5 ninth. He had a 70 and was at 4-under 136.
Jason Day, in his first event as No. 1 in the world, finally looked human. He felt flat, wasn’t sharp off the tee or into the greens, and shot a 71. It was his third round over par in his last 10 tournaments, and it left him nine shots behind.
FIRST TEE OPEN
PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. — Jesper Parnevik birdied three of his last four holes at Poppy Hills for a share of the lead with Tom Byrum in the Champions Tour’s First Tee Open.
Parnevik had a 5-under 66. Byrum birdied the par-5 18th at Pebble Beach for a 5-under 67.
Parnevik had six birdies and one bogey. The 50-year-old Swede is winless in 12 starts on the 50-and-over tour after winning five times on the PGA Tour.
The 54-year-old Byrum had five birdies in a bogey-free round. He was second last year, a stroke behind John Cook, and is winless in 62 career senior starts.
Mark McNulty was third at 4 under after a 68 at Pebble Beach, the site of the final round.
Colin Montgomerie, Sandy Lyle and Woody Austin shot 68 at Poppy Hills to reach 3 under.
Jeff Maggert opened with a 74 at Poppy Hills. He leads the tour with four victories — winning three of his last six starts — and tops the Charles Schwab Cup standings.
Davis Love III had a 75 at Poppy Hills. He won the PGA Tour’s Wyndham Championship last month to become the third-oldest champion in tour history at 51 years, 4 months, 10 days.
NATIONWIDE CHILDREN’S HOSPITAL CHAMPIONSHIP
COLUMBUS, Ohio — Martin Flores shot a 1-under 70 to take a one-stroke lead after the second round of the Web.com Tour Finals’ Nationwide Children’s Hospital Championship.
Flores, tied for the first-round lead after a 67, had three birdies and two bogeys — all on the back nine — to reach 5-under 137 on Ohio State’s difficult Scarlet Course.
The tournament is the third of four events in the series for the top 75 players from the Web.com Tour money list, Nos. 126-200 in the PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup standings and non-members who earned enough money to have placed in the top 200 had they been eligible to receive points.
The top 25 players on Web.com regular-season money list earned PGA Tour cards. They are competing against each other for PGA Tour priority, with regular-season earnings counting in their totals. The other players are fighting for another 25 cards based on series earnings.
Flores was 156th in the FedEx Cup and has made $2,900 in the series.
Sam Saunders, Arnold Palmer’s grandson, was tied for second with Roberto Castro, Luke List and Australia’s Rhein Gibson. List had a 67, and Saunders, Castro and Gibson shot 68.
EUROPEAN OPEN
BAD GRIESBACH, Germany — England’s Graeme Storm chipped in for eagle on the par-5 10th and finished with a 4-under 67 for a share of the second-round lead in the European Open.
England’s Ross Fisher and South Africa’s Charl Schwartzel matched Storm at 10-under 132 on Bad Griesbach’s Franz Beckenbauer Course. Fisher had a 65, and Schwartzel shot 66.
