"Shattered" Harrington in the mix as Carey and Mullarney battle hard on marathon day at The Open
Ronan Mullarney finished in the final group at 10.25 pm
Pádraig Harrington battled through the pain barrier and fired five birdies in a three-under 69 to his keep his dream of a third Claret Jug alive.
Struggling with a knee injury, the two-time Open champion (50) turned in one-under par, then added birdies at the 12th and 14th before following a short par miss at the 16th with a brilliant chip and putt par-save at the 17th and closing birdie to share 13th in his 25th Open appearance.
“I'm shattered,” Harrington said after a gruelling six-hour-plus round. “I'm really tired. I've got a headache. I'm hungry. I've got pizza waiting for me there. Good old manager has two pizzas actually right there.
“I got tired. When I missed the putt on 16, I couldn't see a way home to the clubhouse. I was not in a good place. Missing the putt on 16 really did deflate me.
“It was hard going those last couple of holes. When you're 50 years of age, it's hard to Rolls Royce it on every swing.”
It was nearly as tough for Shane Lowry, Séamus Power and Darren Clarke as the Old Lady of St Andrews showed she still has plenty of teeth in firm and fast conditions.
Lowry drove into gorse at the second and made a double-bogey six, then dropped another shot at the fourth to crash to three-over before fighting back with four birdies and a bogey in his last 14 holes for a 72 that left him tied 55th.
“I got off to the worst possible start and fought back well,” Lowry said. “Would have been really, really nice to hole that putt on the last. After a bad tee shot on the second, didn't really do much wrong after that. Played pretty good for the rest of the day. I'm pretty happy with how I'm playing.
“I know I'm eight behind, but it's a pretty good store score out there today. It's very, very tricky.
“I said to Bo walking up the 5th, I said we've got a few holes left to get this back right. I feel like I've done everything pretty much okay today. Tee shoot right on the 2nd is pretty silly. Other than that, I feel like the rest of the day is pretty good.
I'm not down in the dumps by any means about my day. I'm pretty happy with how I fought. It's tough. There's a lot of -- you need a lot of good bounces, and you need a lot of -- you need to be very clever out there. It's very tricky to play that golf course today for them.”
Power failed to take advantage of the birdie holes and paid for his mistakes as he opened with a rollercoaster 73.
The West Waterford star birdied the first but horseshoed out from two and a half feet for par at the second and bogeyed fourth to slip to one-over.
He birdied the ninth and 10th to get to one-under but drove under the lip of a bunker at the driveable 12th and three-putted for a double-bogey six, then three putted the 17th to slip to two-over before getting a shot back at the last.
“That's definitely got to be by far my worst round of the week to have any sort of chance,” Power said.
As Darren Clarke struggled to a 79 in his 30th Open appearance., qualifiers Ronan Mullarney and David Carey finished in near darkness but did brilliantly to card rounds of 73 and 72.
Carey made three birdies to turn in one-under but he was frustrated to have four three-putts pars before finishing with a birdie.
“Very frustrated after 6 hours 15 minutes. It could have been a lot better,” he said. “It’s not a disaster, and I’m still in it for tomorrow and the next day”
While Mullarney eagled the fifth from 15 feet, then birdied the seventh and eighth to get to three-under only to drop shots at the 11th, 13th, 15th and 17th, finishing at 10.25 pm in the gathering gloom with a missed birdie putt from around 10 feet.
Asked to describe his day, he said: “Long. Very long. It was not so much about finishing in the dark, it was more the breaks between shots. I was good on the front nine. I did better on the tougher holes but then you got firm bounces and had some very long putts.”
Mullarney bogeyed the third but then eagled the fifth and birdied the seventh and eighth to move close to the lead. But he bogeyed the 11th, 13th, 15th and 17th as play slowed to a snail’s pace on a day like no other.
“It was a very long wait to tee off at 4.16 pm. A few of the lads came up to my hotel room to kill some time. I came here and had lunch, went back to my hotel room. I have never had a tee-time like that. That was something new alright.
“We walked on to the 14th tee at 9.15 pm and walked off at 9.40 pm. So we were on that tee for 35 minutes. But that is no excuse.”
Great support from Galway kept him going right to the end.
“It was brilliant,” he said. “Very vocal. I knew that was going to be the case so big thanks to them.”