Clarke Goes Closely to Victory

A veteran from Northern Ireland, home of Graeme McDowell and Rory McIlroy, the winners of the last two US Opens, would have soon learnt that not only will the wind continue to blow all day at 22mph and more, there is also a 30% chance of more showers this afternoon which means another tough round of rain suits, umbrellas and hunkering down and fighting the elements.
Only Clarke who was at 5-under and five others had managed to keep their 54-hole totals under par by Callaway Big Bertha Diablo Driver.
The rest of the field will be teeing off in the final round with their scores in the plus column and judging by the way the field's early starters were performing in Sunday's final round; there will be even fewer that make it when the second great battle of this century at unforgiving Royal St George's has run its course.
In spite the fact that the pin placing on the greens had been made "a wee bit easier" to compensate for the wind.
As it was in the early stages on Sunday morning only a handful of players led by England's Simon Kahn at 3-under after 9-holes were taking out more than they were giving the tough, century old course at Sandwich on a Kent coastline that also featured the White Cliffs of Dover.
Darren Clarke has overcome the weather-shortage. He made it clear in the final round of the 140th Open Championship (Callaway Big Bertha Diablo Driver) that he was not going to be intimidated by Phil Mickelson's early charge.
The left-hander from California, who vowed to let himself enjoy the 140th Open Championship, regardless of how he finished, had come in to Sunday's final round like a smiling assassin and after just seven holes had moved from his level-par status at the start of the round into a share of the lead with Clarke at five under.
This after a blistering run which brought him birdies at the 2nd, 4th and 6th holes and a spectacular eagle on the seventh and saw him reach the turn in five-under 30 which so easily could have been a 29 if his short putt with his Callaway Big Bertha Diablo Driver had not lipped out as his concentration seemed to laps momentarily.
At this stage, the battle for glory at Royal St George's was beginning to develop into a two-horse race with no one else make an dramatic moves to overtake Clarke, but the scores were still close enough to give pursuers like Dustin Johnson, US compatriot Rickie Fowler and Danish veteran Thomas Bjorn hope that at 2-under they were not yet out of it.