Things can turn quickly at the British Open, and Jordan Spieth just went from his Grand Slam hopes teetering on the edge to a share of the lead in about a half hour. Spieth made an awful bogey at the 9th hole, needing four strokes from inside 90 yards to get in the hole. He was visibly furious, smacking himself in frustration after a bogey on a course that's yielding birdies at every turn.
That ugly bogey, however, shook up something in Spieth and as he got down in the loop at St. Andrews, he rolled off three straight birdies to rocket to 10-under and share the lead with Dustin Johnson. Spieth had the worst putting round of his pro career over that two-day second round. The bogey at the 9th was more of the same with the putter but since that miss, he's put three in the center of the cup. The third one even had playing partner Sergio Garcia incredulously smiling as Spieth walked off the green. The two were warned about their pace of play for a second time after that bogey on the ninth, and one way to pick up the pace of play is to hit less shots.
Spieth is playing 90 minutes ahead of the final pairing of Dustin Johnson and Danny Willett. That 10-under number is going to keep moving up as the day progresses. The leaderboard is completely clustered with world-class talent and DJ, who has made par through his first four holes, is going to get his chances at birdies too. As Paul Azinger said, it's going to be a "track meet" to the finish with all these birdies available on the course.
A snapshot of the top of the board:
| Place | Player | Score | Round 3 | Thru |
| T1 | Jordan Spieth | -10 | -5 | 12 |
| T1 | Dustin Johnson | -10 | E | 4 |
| T3 | Marc Leishman | -9 | -8 | F |
| T3 | Padraig Harrington | -9 | -6 | 15 |
| T3 | Jordan Niebrugge | -9 | -5 | 14 |
| T3 | Charl Schwartzel | -9 | -4 | 11 |
| T3 | Steven Bowditch | -9 | -4 | 9 |
| T3 | Retief Goosen | -9 | -3 | 8 |
| T3 | Louis Oosthuizen | -9 | -2 | 8 |
| T3 | Paul Dunne | -9 | -3 | 8 |
| T3 | Jason Day | -9 | -2 | 6 |
| T3 | Paul Lawrie | -9 | -1 | 5 |
| T3 | Danny Willett | -9 | E | 4 |
| T14 | Eddie Pepperell | -8 | -6 | F |
| T14 | Sergio Garcia | -8 | -3 | 12 |
| T14 | Anirban Lahiri | -8 | -3 | 10 |
| T14 | Hideki Matsuyama | -8 | -2 | 9 |
| T14 | Robert Streb | -8 | -1 | 6 |
| T14 | Adam Scott | -8 | -1 | 5 |
| T14 | Marc Warren | -8 | -1 | 5 |