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Jason Gore

Thirty strokes separated John Daly from the winner of the US Open at Pinehurst in 1999 - and the gulf looks like being equally wide this year - if his Sunday start means anything. But Jason Gore is another story.

Daly, whose frustration boiled over last time when he smashed the ball with his putter as it rolled back down a slope towards him, ran up a triple bogey seven on the second hole and dropped into the last place he held on his angry exit six years ago.

The former Open champion - he returns next month to the scene of his triumph at St Andrews - was 16 over par as a result.

That was 19 shots adrift of South African Retief Goosen, who took a three-stroke lead into the final day of his bid for a third victory in five years.

But as Daly battled to keep a lid on his famed ability to self-destruct and played the next seven holes in one under, there was a new larger-than-life crowd favourite to cheer for in beefy, 17-stone Jason Gore.

The defending champion versus the world number 818, on the last day of the US Open - and in the last group on the course!

For Gore it all means living an impossible dream just a few days after his car was ransacked and a computer, a stereo, CDs, a PlayStation and some of his wife's clothes taken.

To put it into context, compare Gore's achievement with Daly, who was 168th when he "came from nowhere" as the ninth reserve to win the 1991 US PGA at Crooked Stick.

Daly was all of 650 places higher than Gore is now.

Since the world rankings began in 1986, the most unlikely winner of a major was Ben Curtis at the Open two years ago - but he was "only" 396th.

Gore, a member of the 1997 US Walker Cup team whose father died suddenly of a heart attack at 54 in the year he turned professional, is not a member of the US PGA Tour at present and has not even had a top 10 finish on the "second division" Nationwide circuit.

He came through a qualifier to get to Pinehurst, but in that he is not alone on the leaderboard.

Olin Browne, lying joint second with him with a round to go and ranked 300th himself, scored a 59 in the second round of his qualifier after an opening 77, while New Zealander Michael Campbell, joint fourth with Australian Mark Hensby, birdied the last hole of his qualifier at Walton Heath in Britain's first-ever US qualifier to avoid a play-off.

But they have both been tour winners. Gore is trying to earn more in one day - first prize is £645,410 - than in his entire career.

He said: "It's easy to say how calm we're going to be - but we're all freaking out inside."

As a 31-year-old who was an amateur star, he is well-known to 29-year-old fellow Californian Tiger Woods, whom he led by three shots heading into Sunday.

"He's got all the talent in the world," commented Woods. "He's always been a long hitter. It's just a matter of fine-tuning his swing and he's done that."

Gary Wolstenholme, the British amateur always to be remembered for beating Woods in the 1995 Walker Cup, will recall him from the match two years later at Quaker Ridge.

They were opponents in the opening foursomes and Gore, so emotional that he cried at the flag-raising ceremony, smashed his first drive 100 yards past Wolstenholme's.

To complete the fairytale, though, the man playing only his second major had to catch the man who has won two - both of them US Opens.

Goosen was trying to join Ben Hogan and Curtis Strange as the only back-to-back winner of the title since the Second World War and a hat-trick victories in the event which put him in a club with Scotland's 19th Century star, Willie Anderson, Bobby Jones, the greatest amateur of them all, and three of the 20th century's golfing legends in  Ben Hogan, Jack Nicklaus and Hale Irwin.

Himself a member of the European tour, he was also trying to prevent an end to a barren spell for European golfers at the championship going back to Tony Jacklin in 1970.

Lee Westwood and Swede Peter Hedblom - yet another qualifier - were best placed at three over, but that was six adrift of Goosen, who despite not hitting a single fairway on the back nine of his third round 69, had the temperament and strength out of the rough and to get up and birdie the 14th, 15th and 18th to go clear of the field.

Woods' hopes of achieving the second leg of an unprecedented Grand Slam were hanging by a thread too.

Another seven went on Daly's card at the long 10th on Sunday - the hopes of Colin Montgomerie and Ernie Els had nose-dived by taking the same score on that hole in the second and third rounds respectively - but even at 17-over, Daly was still seven strokes off last place at that stage

Down at the rear now was fellow American Jerry Kelly, who turned in 41 and then had a triple bogey seven on the 11th to be 24 over.

A year ago at Shinnecock Hills Kelly was one of 28 players who failed to break 80 in the nightmarish final round and said of the United States Golf Association in regard to the course set-up: "When are they going to grow a head? If they were smart they'd realise they look really stupid."

He was nine-over par for his first 11 today and another score in the 80s loomed.

Els and Phil Mickelson were able to improve their positions to seven over after the opening stretch, Els with birdies at the first and fourth and Mickelson with one on the third.
But with more wind than for the first three days, a score of level par or better - is going to take some high-quality golf - again