McILROY OFF TO A FLYER
Holywood star matches Tiger with stunning opening round 62
RORY McILROY was on course for a magical 59 but was forced to settle for an eight-under 62 alongside Tiger Woods in the first round of the BMW Championship in Philadelphia.
Starting at the 10th hole, the world number eight took advantage of wide fairways and soft greens to race to nine-under par with four holes to go at par-70 Aronimink.
But he bogeyed the seventh and eighth before finishing with a birdie four to join Woods on eight-under par, just one stroke clear of US Ryder Cup wildcard hopeful Xander Schauffele.
The County Down star followed a seven-footer at the 11th by making two 20-footers in a row at the 12th and 13th for a hat-trick of early birdies.
But he didn’t have to make a putt outside nine feet as he reeled off six birdies in a row.
After making birdie at the 18th to turn in 31 he then picked up a shot on his first five holes coming home before he missed the seventh fairway, bunkered his approach and missed a 12-footer for par.
He then missed the green at the parthree eighth and failed from 20 feet for par before bouncing back with a two-putt birdie four at the ninth.
Woods looked back to his very best after going back to his trusty Scotty Cameron putter, racking up an eagle and seven birdies in his 62 to set the clubhouse target.
“I’ve been monkeying around with it back home and in the backyard,” Woods said of his decision to go back to his favourite putter.
“I know the release point and I know how it swings and my body morphed into a position where it understands where it needs to be to release the putter.”
The 14-time Major winner (42) struggled with the blade in the first two playoff events, finishing 40th in the Northern Trust and tied 24th in the Dell Technologies Championship in Boston on Monday.
But he was on fire with his putter last night, making a 20-footer at the 10th (his first), a 13-footer at the 12th and a 10-footer at the 13th, before making eagle from five feet at the 15th.
Out in 29 after another birdie from inside six feet at the 18th – his lowest nine-hole score since 2007 – he birdied the first and seventh to move to eight-under before a tugged tee shot at the par-three eighth led to his first bogey.
On the European Tour, Paul Dunne found just three fairways as he opened with a one-over 71 in the Omega European Masters at Crans-sur-Sierre.
The world number 88 bogeyed three of his first five holes but after fighting back to level par with birdies at the seventh, eighth and 10th, he mixed birdies at the 14th and 15th with bogeys at the 11th, 16th and 18th to lie seven shots behind leader Maximilian Kieffer in tied 81st.
The German birdied three of his last five holes for a six-under 64 and a one-shot lead over Frenchman Julien Guerrier, Dane Soren Kjeldsen, England’s Andy Sullivan and Japan’s Hideto Tanihara.
In the Challenge Tour’s Bridgestone Challenge, John Ross Galbraith shot a two-under 69 and Old Conna’s Neil O’Briain a 70 as the Czech Republic’s Stanislav Matus fired a 10-under 61 to lead by two shots from Australia’s Dimitrios Papadatos, Sweden’s Sebastian Soderberg, England’s Tom Lewis and English amateur Thomas Sloman.
Cormac Sharvin, Chris Selfridge, Jonny Caldwell and Ruaidhri McGee were a shot outside the cut mark after level-par 71s with Paul McBride tied 133rd after a 74.