Jessi Gebhardt (right) closed the third Grasshopper Tour event with a fantastic four-under 67 Thursday, completing the 54 holes on two-under 211 - four back of winner Alena Sharp. Gebhardt and Sharp were the only two players to finish the tournment under par, and Gebhardt's third round was the best of the day by four. The Bellingham native, now living in Arizona, made seven birdies on the Darryl Wilson-designed Lone Tree GC in Chandler, Ariz., but says her game was so good she could have had more.
"I was hitting the ball so well, and found a lot of greens," Gebhardt told BellinghamGolfer this morning. "I putted okay obviously, but if I'd putted as well as I know I can, the score would have been even better."
The runner-up finish makes four top-tens in a row to start the season for Gebhardt. In the first week of February, she finished tied for tenth in a Cactus Tour event. She then tied for tenth again at the inaugural Grasshopper tournament the week after, and followed that with a tie for sixth in her second Grasshopper outing. In her first 12 competitive rounds of the year, she has averaged 73.2.
"I have worked hard on my game over the winter, especially the mental side," she says. "It is so easy once you get to three or four under to start getting ahead of yourself and thinking 'if I can just par in...'. But I'm getting better at taking one shot at a time."
Gebhardt's early-season form bodes well for the coming year. She plays one more Cactus Tour event in Arizona before rejoining the LPGA Futures Tour (now the Symetra Tour) at the end of the month.
Peter Christoper moved to the top of the Lake Padden Winter Golf Tour standings after securing 25 points in last weekend's Tip-N-Tuck. Christopher goes into the final event of the season on 155 points, five ahead of Yvon Charbonneau. The final event - the WGT Finale - is an individual/skins format and will be played tomorrow (Saturday, March 3rd).
WGT standings here.
