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Under Parma

Under Parma

Moving Day at the 2014 Rochester Flying Disc Open

Saturday, September 6, 2014 - 19:59

ROCHESTER, NY – Just because it’s moving day doesn’t mean there has to be a lot of movement. That was certainly the case today during Round 3 of the 2014 Rochester Flying Disc Open. This could perhaps be a result of Parma’s course design, a fantastic layout where players need to hit precise and accurate lines using virtually every type of throw in disc golf to succeed.

In the Open division, the rankings after today’s round were minimally shuffled. Of the top four groups (16 players), only three names will be different going into the final round tomorrow back at Chili DGC. Drew Gibson #48346, Mark Peters #45745, and Owen Hileman #32715 all played well enough this afternoon to grab spots in the top 16, taking the places of Eric McCabe #11674, Devin Frederick #16287, and Dan Hastings #33504.

The real story of the day in Open was the bogey-free lights out round of 10 under par by Dave Feldberg #12626. He’s the kind of guy that always jokes about how difficult it is to keep up with the younger guys, but he never seems to slip too far from having his name on the leaderboard. Dave outplayed the entire field today, hitting his lines off the tee with backhands and backhand rollers, and followed that up by nailing all the big birdie putts when he needed to. Dave replaced the previous leader Simon Lizotte #8332, and will head into the final round tomorrow in the lead by one, joined once again by Lizotte, Nate Doss #11794, and Jeremy Koling #33705.

In the Open Women’s division, only one woman was able to make a big move this afternoon; Val Jenkins #17495. She started the day in fifth place, four strokes back from Sarah Hokom #34563. Val finished with the second best score of the day in her division, an even par 57 bested only by the current leader Paige Pierce #29190 with a 56. Val will start the final round in fourth place, this time with a four stroke lead over Hokom.

Pierce has a commanding lead at this point, ahead by seven over Catrina Allen #44184. The gap between Allen and Liz Dorries #31162 in third place is yet another seven strokes. It will take an all-out collapse at Chili DGC tomorrow for Pierce to lose her lead, and the same can be said about Allen’s chances of dropping down to third or fourth place. Both of them have thrown 1000+ rated rounds at Chili in this tournament. We can only expect much of the same tomorrow.

2011 Masters World Champion and recent recipient of the PDGA Bob West Memorial Sportsmanship Award, Jon Baldwin #18114 is again showing why he has earned both of those esteemed honors. After taking the lead in the Masters division during the second round on Friday at Chili, he had a chance at redemption at the much tighter Parma course this morning. He didn’t disappoint, shooting the hot round in his division of 55, stretching his lead to six over the always-charging Michael Herzog #9605. Rounding out the lead card will be Tony Inzana #15770 and the man who perhaps grinds it out the most on tour, Pete Johnson #9009.

The Grandmaster division is as tight as it has been all weekend. With only 18 holes left to play, there are 11 competitors within six strokes of the lead. Gary Crowley #15889 from Syracuse, NY has been impressive all weekend and sits tied at the top after a great round of one under par today. His counterpart, Leroy Jenkins #5085, threw a hole-in-one ace on Friday at Parma, and kept that momentum and energy heading into his round this morning. He finished the day with a score just one off of Crowley, an even par 57. Crowley and Jenkins have both thrown rounds of 56, 57, and a 58 this weekend, essentially matching each other shot for shot. With Bobby Jones #3087 just a single stroke back, and a slew of others within striking range, they’ll need to continue their stellar play to hang on for a victory.

Be sure to join us tomorrow as the PDGA National Tour comes to its culmination. Ironically, after nearly an entire season with terrible weather (terrible is a nice way to describe it), conditions are forecasted to be nearly perfect as the tour comes to a close. DiscGolfPlanet.tv will be here filming, as well as McFlySoHigh Video, and as always you can watch live hole-by-hole scores come pouring in on PDGALive.com complete with pictures and videos of all the action.

It’s only fitting that the end of the PDGA National Tour Elite Series be punctuated by one of the longest running events in disc golf history, the Rochester Flying Disc Open. See you tomorrow!