Expectant Mom Delivers Minus 2

The gallery rooted for one and a half golfers Friday. Dawn Coe-Jones, who says her nightmare is giving birth in a bunker, lit up the U.S. Women’s Open here in maternity clothes.

It is not called “The Open” for nothing. Expectant mothers are welcome, and Coe-Jones remained in contention Friday afternoon even though she is six months pregnant with her first child.

“I ran a little today and some lady screamed, ‘Don’t run. Please, don’t run,”’ she said Friday.

Coe-Jones sat cross-legged on fairways, scouted out the rest rooms, confirmed that she is due three months from Saturday and still brandished a two-day, 2-under-par score of 138 - one stroke off the lead of Friday’s early finishers.

Mother nature was, in fact, the theme of the day - from pregnancy to grizzly bears to lightning. Low clouds at the mountainous Broadmoor Resort turned gray and damp at about 4 p.m., and a subsequent electric storm forced a suspension of play. At the time, a myriad of golfers - ages 16 to 44 - were juxtaposed on the leader board.

There were a pair of fortysomethings, Pat Bradley and Dale Eggeling, who made morning charges and equaled Coe-Jones’ score of 2-under-par. There was Thursday’s leader, Jill Briles-Hinton, who shanked her first shot of the day off a tree and slumped from 4-under-par to 2-under-par - before being saved by the claps of thunder at the 16th tee.

There were Jean Bartholomew, Kris Tschetter and Val Skinner, all tied for the lead at 3-under-par but having their momentum dashed by the rain. Bartholomew was on the sixth tee, Skinner was on the seventh and Tschetter was on the 11th.

There was the phenom of the month, 16-year-old Grace Park, bogeying her first hole, birdieing her third and remaining 1-under-par through five holes when the storm hit.

Defending champion Patty Sheehan made an enemy Thursday night. She was sleeping when a grizzly bear apparently brushed the side of her mountain cabin here and awoke her at about 2 a.m. She locked the door, tossed and turned from then on, shot a tired 73 Friday and sits at an uncustomary 3-over-par.