Fortune swings against Ryan Fox
Ryan Fox has all but fallen out of contention at the 2024 US Masters, after a third round of five-over at Augusta National. Having made the cut on Saturday (NZ time), Fox left the course yesterday in a share of
26th place at four-over for the tournament, heading into the final round today.
At four-over, the Kiwi is tied with
Australia’s Adam Scott, who won the green jacket in 2013, and is 11 shots off the pace.
American world No 1 Scottie Scheffler held the outright lead at one-under yesteday and seven-under overall.
Scheffler was closely followed by his compatriots, with Colin Morikawa (six-under) in second, and Max Homa (five-under) two shots back.
However, Fox’s day could have finished in better fashion, after hitting the flag at the par four 17th, as the ball trickled into the bunker en route to a triple bogey for the Kiwi, before dropping another shot on the 18th.
All up, Fox finished with four birdies, six bogeys and the triple bogey for his day’s work.
Starting the day at one-under, Fox began brightly, and peeled off three successive birdies to start the day, and surged up the leaderboard at four-under.
But given the challenging course conditions on offer at Augusta, Fox quickly came back down to earth to finish his front nine.
After three straight pars, Fox dropped three shots in as many holes from the seventh to the ninth, and lost any ground gained from his three birdies, and finish his front nine at even par.
Then, to make matters worse, the 37-yearold dropped another shot on the 10th, and moved to one-over for his third round.
A birdie on the 13th gave promise of a recovery on the back nine, only to drop another shot on the 14th, before the disaster on the 17th.
Going into today’s final round, Fox held the same place on the leaderboard as his finish in 2023, in what was his first visit to the Masters as a player.