Key events
Jon Rahm, in the zone, cares not one jot for the OB down the right of 18. He absolutely larrups his drive down the middle. Meanwhile it’s another gettable birdie chance missed McIlroy; he’s now 50-50 for conversion, and growls in frustration as he tidies up for par. His tee to green play has been exemplary so far; he could so easily have started with four straight birdies. He arguably should have, because the putts he’s missed were makeable. Are we holding Rory to unreasonably high standards? Possibly. Probably. Though you suspect he’s doing that himself. He’s -3.
Rory McIlroy plays another hole perfectly from tee to green. He makes the putt this time, at 3, and joins the group at -3. The crowd respond accordingly. Roar! They also respond as you’d expect at 17: a sigh of disappointment as Jon Rahm leaves his 15-foot birdie putt short on the low side. He tidies up for his par and moves onto the last, where a birdie would give him a 63.
Jon Rahm is on one! He drains a tramliner across 16, and that’s six birdies in the last eight holes! Should he par the last two holes, he’ll be signing for a 64, which would be a new Open record at Hoylake, beating the 65 jointly held by Tiger Woods, Ernie Els, Chris DiMarco, Sergio Garcia, Dustin Johnson, Jim Furyk, Marc Leishman, Shane Lowry, and Chris Wood. A reminder that the Open record is 62, set by Branden Grace at Birkdale in 2017, and that’s also the major-championship record, which was equa…
