Anirban Lahiri put himself in contention for his maiden PGA Tour title as he played one of the best rounds in the field on a difficult third day at the CJ Cup @ Nine Bridges today.
Lahiri carded three-under 69, the third best card in the field today, to move to tied 3rd with one more round to go.
The 30-year-old Indian, whose career-best finish on the PGA Tour is a tied-2nd at the Memorial in 2017, is now seven- under 209.
Lahiri is two shots behind co-leaders Justin Thomas (70) and Scott Brown (71), who are at nine-under 207.
Whee Kim (70) is tied for fifth after a 72, alongside Australian youngster Cameron Smith (73) and former 2009 US Open winner Lucas Glover (74).
Korea's An Byeong Hun (67), one of the only two players to shoot better than Lahiri in third round, was tied-8th with overnight leader Luke List (76).
On a day when wind was between 10-20 miles per hour most of the time, there were gusts going up to 25-30 mph, the scoring average for the field was 74.795, Lahiri was almost five shots better than that.
Starting the day five shots off the lead, Lahiri had four birdies and one bogey, and is now just two behind.
Thomas, the reigning FedExCup Champion offset a lone double bogey and a bogey with five birdies to reach nine-under 207, while Brown had back-to-back bogeys on Nos. 10 and 11 but recovered with a birdie on 15, adding to the one he had on the par-4 fifth.
Lahiri was sharing third place with Australian Marc Leishman (71).
After the round, Lahiri said, "It was really tough. Right around the 5th or 6th hole the wind started gusting and whipping. The back nine was incredibly hard, especially coming in. You just had to try to take an advantage of the holes that were down wind and reachable.
"It was just a matter of making pars after that. It's hard and you need to putt well and stay calm."
Lahiri had birdies on second, fifth and sixth on front nine followed by a fourth on 10th. For a brief period he even held joint lead. A bogey on 16th dropped him back, but he finished the day at tied-3rd.
Overnight leader List struggled with the windy conditions and fell into a tie for eighth place after a 76. List had three bogeys on the front nine and a pair of double bogeys on the back nine.
Jason Day also struggled with the wind, carding a 71 to be tied for 16th.
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