Shane Lowry grabs two-shot lead at 152nd Open Championship

Irishman Shane Lowry survived misadventure at No. 11 and birdied two of his final three holes to claim the second-round lead at the 152nd Open Championship on Friday at Royal Troon.

Lowry’s two-putt birdie at the par-5 16th hole and his 20 1/2-foot putt at the 18th gave him a 2-under-par 69. At 7-under 135, he has a two-shot edge over Englishmen Daniel Brown and Justin Rose entering the weekend in Troon, South Ayrshire, Scotland.

“I know (Saturday) is going to be a long day, but I’ve done it before,” the 2019 Open champion said after his morning round. “Going out there leading the tournament, who knows if I’m going to be leading by the end of the day? With these conditions, probably will be, but we’ll have to wait and see.”

Stiff winds exceeding 30 mph around the seaside course kept scores down in the afternoon. No one shot better than a 3-under 68 Friday, and Rose’s was the only 68 from the afternoon wave.

After carding three birdies and one bogey on the front nine, Lowry’s second shot at the par-4 11th got lost in the rough, and he hit a provisional ball onto the green. Then his original ball was found; by rule he was required to play it. It took 20 minutes between shots for Lowry to make the decision to take a penalty stroke and a drop.

He hit a blind shot over shrubbery onto the green and double bogeyed back to 5 under.

“The referee asked me going down, did I want to find my first one, and I said no. So I assumed that was OK,” Lowry said. “Then we get down there, and somebody had found it. So apparently we have to find it then, or you have to go and identify it, which I thought, if you declared it lost before it was found, that you didn’t, you didn’t have to go and identify it.

“… To be honest, I was happy enough leaving there with a 6. It was not like — it wasn’t a disaster. I was still leading the tournament.”

Brown, the surprise 18-hole leader in his major championship debut, followed his first-round 65 with a 1-over 72. The No. 272-ranked golfer said he watched from home when Lowry won the 2019 Open and appreciates Lowry’s grit and determination.

“Hopefully I’ll get to witness that firsthand (Saturday) and try and hopefully go toe to toe with him,” Brown said.

Rose, 43, didn’t make his first bogey of the tournament until the 12th hole Friday. He capitalized at Nos. 16 and 18 with birdie putts, the latter a 41-foot bomb that ignited the home crowd.

Like Brown, Rose had to earn his spot in the Open field as a qualifier. The one-time major champ, who placed fourth at the 1998 Open as an amateur, wants to win this major more than any other.

“You’ve got to be in it to win it, and the first big part of the journey was getting in the tournament,” Rose said.

“… I look back (at qualifying), we played in a really, really tough westerly breeze. That golf course is incredibly difficult in a westerly and I think even that little bit of experience of (getting) back playing some tough links golf has probably helped me a little bit these last two days.”

World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler carded a 70 to join a tie at 2 under with Billy Horschel (68) and South Africa’s Dean Burmester (69). Scheffler holed a 35-foot birdie putt at the par-3 14th and added a birdie at No. 16 to get to 3 under, but he found a pot bunker off the 18th tee and finished up with a bogey.

The two-time Masters winner — whose caddie, Ted Scott, dealt with a stomach illness throughout the day — is in contention to win his first major outside Augusta National.

“So far it’s been two really successful days, keeping my head in it nice and taking the good breaks and the bad breaks in stride and just continuing to grind. So that’s what’s most important to me,” Scheffler said.

Tied at 1 under are Xander Schauffele (72), Patrick Cantlay (68), Australia’s Jason Day (68) and Canada’s Corey Conners (70). Chile’s Joaquin Niemann and England’s Matthew Jordan both shot 71 and are tied at even par. The group at 1 over includes major champions Dustin Johnson (69), Collin Morikawa (70), Jon Rahm of Spain (70) and Brooks Koepka (73).

Justin Thomas began the day in third place at 3 under but shot a disastrous 9-over 45 on his front nine, capped by a triple bogey at No. 9, to plummet out of contention. He righted the ship on the back nine, finishing with a 78 to make the cut by two shots.

Tiger Woods followed an opening 79 with a 6-over 77 Friday to finish the two rounds at 14 over, missing the cut at his third straight major.

Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland joined Woods in the double digits at 11 over par after a 75. On the way to a triple-bogey 8 at No. 4, McIlroy hit his second shot only two yards in a native area. His fifth shot crossed the green into a bunker, and he missed a double-bogey putt from 4 feet.

Other notable players on the wrong side of the 6-over cut line included U.S. Open champion Bryson DeChambeau (9 over), Englishman Tommy Fleetwood (9 over), Norway’s Viktor Hovland (10 over) and 2022 Open champ Cameron Smith of Australia (12 over).

–Field Level Media