Golfer 'underdog' leads Arnold Palmer Invitational 2023

When the second round was over, Kitayama took the top spot at -9. Going to the penultimate stage on March 4, the golfer currently ranked 46th OWGR lost the lead when he dropped to -7 after 15 holes with two birdies, two bogeys and double bogey. However, the 30-year-old American golfer returned to the top of the table, at -9 thanks to two birdies through the last three holes.

Viktor Hovland with 66 strokes, achieved the best record in the third round. That form helped the Swiss player rise 18 places to T2 (-8), alongside defending champion Scottie Scheffler. Eight hands behind T2 within four strokes, including Rory McIlroy at T5, Justin Thomas T7 and Max Homa T10. On OWGR, Scheffler is 2nd, just above McIlroy, six places ahead of Homa while Thomas is 9th, Hovland is 11th.

In the past 12 months, Kitayama has missed the podium three times in the US first-class golf arena. All three of those times, he finished runner-up or T2, and as such has yet to win a cup through 86 attempts on the PGA Tour.

At the Arnold Palmer Invitational 2022, Scheffler set the winning milestone -5, and Hovland finished T2 (-4), when the tournament was still a select player in the PGA Tour calendar with a position just lower than the major and The Players Championship.

This year's Arnold Palmer Invitational is still taking place at Bay Hill par72 in Florida as usual since its opening in 1966. The tournament brings together nearly all of the top 50 in the world (OWGR table), and is placed in a special group, on par with The Players. . With a new position, the cup competition with the title of golf legend at Bay Hill has a prize fund of 20 million USD, of which the first prize is 3.6 million USD.