Missing three cuts in six starts this year, Szery Matilda Castren (Helsinki, Finland) kept consistent this afternoon at Mission Inn Resort and Club in the second round, carding back-to-back 5-under 68’s. She went bogey free on day two.
The Florida State University alumna takes a three-shot lead into the final round at 10-under par overall. She will head off No. 1 tee at 11:40 a.m. ET tomorrow in the final threesome. Her highest finish thus far on the Epson Tour was a tie for 19th at the Four Winds Invitational in 2018.
“I've been hitting the ball really well the past few months really so I'm just looking to keep doing that tomorrow and try to make some more putts,” said Castren. “I just feel way more comfortable playing now. My first year and a half or two years, I was putting a lot of pressure on myself and I wasn't really performing how I wanted so I wasn't really enjoying it that much. I had to change my mindset, and last year I got my LPGA card. It was it was really a result of a lot of like mental work and also improvements and my golf game, too.”
SZERYK PUTTING HELPS HER INTO LAST GROUP FOR THE FINAL ROUND
Member of Team Canada, Maddie Szeryk (London, Ontario), went 5-under in the second round in Lake County, tying her round low for the 2020 season in Howey-In-The-Hills, Fla. Today. She will join the leader group for the final round tomorrow.
k is happy to see certain parts of her game come together over the last 36 holes in Florida. She looks to improve on her season-best tie for 11th, at the FireKeepers Casino Hotel Championship, tomorrow afternoon.
“It felt really good to put a good score together. I’ve been struggling but feeling like it was kind of close to it was nice to see it all come together,” said Szeryk. “My putting was way better and that is something I have struggled with past couple of tournaments. My stroke felt really good today, I was matching the lines and the speed perfectly and had a couple others just on the edge.”
JOHANNSON FOCUSED ON ONE ROUND AT A TIME
Rounding out the Mission Inn Resort final threesome is Linnea Johansson (Bastad, Sweden), currently No. 38 in the Volvik Race for the Card. Johansson earned that spot by firing a bogey-free, 2-under par 71 on day two in Central Florida.
The three-time All-Big 12 performer for Oklahoma State University has finished in the top-20 in all three Epson Tour events she has competed in this season. The closest Johansson has come to winning on the “Road to the LPGA” was a third-place finish at the 2018 FireKeepers Casino Hotel Championship.
This week is the first of four tournaments in a row for Johansson and she is keeping her focus on playing well one round as a time.
“I was hitting good shots all day, had a lot of good opportunities to make birdies and wasn't really close to making a bogey. I didn’t really make a lot of putts today but play I played very consistent so that was that was good,” said Johansson. “I’m just focus on my long-term goals and take one shot at a time and one round at a time. I have four events in a row, including this one, so I am just trying to make each and every round as good as I can and go as low as possible.”