Ruoning Yin, the No. 4 ranked player in the world, was phenomenal Saturday at The Black Desert Championship, shooting the round of the tournament with a -10 62.
Yin started the third round outside of the top 20 at -6, but wasted no time in shooting up the leaderboard in the third round. Yin made birdies on the second and third holes, and followed that up with more on 6, 7 and 9.
She really kicked it into another gear starting on hole 12, where she put together a string of four birdies in a row before finishing off her round with another on 18.
It should come as no surprise that Yin dominated with her ball striking, hitting 17 greens and 13 fairways in the third round. For the week she has hit 40/42 fairways in total. As is usually the case when Yin plays at an elite level, her putting matched her long-range game, as she needed only 25 strokes with the flat stick.
Yin was involved in the playoff last week at The Chevron Championship, where she seemed to be in position to win after the group’s approach shots, as she was the only one on the green in two and had a makable putt. She hit it too hard though and left herself a tough comeback putt, which she also missed. The 22-year-old from China is looking for her first win of the season and sixth of her career.
Haeran Ryu still leads, as she has for most of the week. Ryu shot a solid 68 in the third round, buoyed by a hole-out eagle on the 11th hole. Ryu also had five birdies but three bogeys. She missed a short putt on 18 to head into the final round with a three-stroke advantage.
Olympic silver medalist Esther Henseleit rounds out the group within three strokes of Ryu’s lead, sitting at -15. She had an up-and-down day that included a sloppy double bogey on the par 5 18th hole. Outside of that she had eight birdies and two bogeys.
The final round of The Black Desert Championship kicks off at 1:30 eastern time on NBC Sports Digital.
