Bogota, Colombia – Patrick Cantlay fired a 6-under 65 on Saturday to join Jim Renner atop the leaderboard through three rounds of the Colombia Championship.
The overnight co-leader Renner stayed on top with a 5-under 66 at the Country Club of Bogota's Fundadores Course, while the other second-round frontrunners failed to keep pace.
Cantlay and Renner are 13-under 200 through 54 holes, two strokes ahead of Shane Bertsch, who carded a 67 on Saturday.
"I like clean rounds like that," said Cantlay. "I hit a lot of good putts today. My putting stroke just feels really good."
Bhavik Patel lost his share of the overnight lead with a triple bogey on the opening hole, but the rookie recovered and turned in a 69 to end the third round alone in fourth place at 10-under.
Ryan Spears (68) and Steve Wheatcroft (69) are tied for fifth at 9-under, while Bio Kim (65), Alex Cejka (68), Michael Putnam (69), Alexandre Rocha (69), Roger Sloan (69) and Edward Loar (70) sit a shot back.
B.J. Staten and D.J. Brigman, the other second-round leaders, shot 73 and 74, respectively. The former is 6-under through 54 and the latter is 5-under.
Kevin Foley, the winner of last week's season-opening Panama Claro Championship, is 4-under.
First-round leader Danny Lee continued his descent with his second straight 74 on Saturday. The 22-year-old, who tied for 13th at the PGA Tour's Sony Open in Hawaii in January, is hoping to regain full time status on that circuit after an underwhelming rookie campaign in 2012.
Cantlay opened with his bogey-free third round with a trio of pars before picking up a shot at the fourth. After another birdie on the seventh, the 20- year-old grabbed sole possession of the lead with an eagle at the par-5 eighth.
A run of five straight Cantlay pars followed and Renner took advantage, recovering from a slow start with an impressive stretch around the turn to pull even.
Renner bogeyed Nos. 2 and 6, but he bounced back with an eagle/birdie/eagle trek beginning at the eighth. The 29-year-old's three on the par-5 10th tied him with Cantlay at minus-11.
Both players picked up a pair of birdies the rest of the way, with Cantlay turning the trick at Nos. 14 and 16, and Renner matching him at the 13th and 14th to hit the clubhouse in a dead heat.
"After the bogey at six I just tried to stay confident," Renner said. "It was a rough start but I had some good fortune and battled back."
NOTES:Renner leapt 26 places on Friday with his bogey-free 66 ... Defending champion Skip Kendall missed Friday's cut at 6-over. The veteran was looking to become the first player in Web.com Tour history to successfully defend his title ...Brenden Pappas, the 2011 champion of this event, withdrew before the start of the second round due to illness. Briny Baird withdrew on Friday with a shoulder injury ... The Web.com Tour concludes its three- week stay in South America next week with the Chile Classic, where Paul Haley II captured the 2012 title.
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