“I thought it was a good round to back up the low round (Thursday)”, Mickelson said.
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Either Lefty’s head has gotten smaller (doubtful) or his hat is the wrong size, but either way, in the intermittent heavy rain and occasionally blustery breeze Friday, Mickelson did exactly what he needed to do at Royal Troon, following up a low round with a solid 69 to hold off his pack of pursuers and retain the lead – albeit a slimmer one – heading into the weekend.
His fellow Scandinavian, Soren Kjeldsen of Denmark, is joint-third along with American Keegan Bradley on seven-under after both shot 68s.
The 46-year-old finally made his breakthrough in the majors when he won the Masters at Augusta in 2004 and the Californian has since collected a further four, including the Open at Muirfield in 2013.
“It’s still early in the tournament, though”. We’re only halfway through.
Conditions were perfectly acceptable on the front nine and Mickelson took advantage with early birdies at the fourth and seventh. “It’s not easy out there”.
With two holes to play, he was 2 over for the round and back to even par for the tournament, 11 shots behind leaders Phil Mickelson and Henrik Stenson.
The Madison golfer began his second go-round at Royal Troon with 14 consecutive pars to stay on the leaderboard. When it wasn’t pouring, there were plenty of birdies.
“He’s going to be tough to beat, but I’ve won tournaments from a long way back before and I’ve just got to draw on those memories”.
“I think there is a lot of pressure off me given the fact that I’ve already got one”.
McIlroy got within five shots of the lead until the weather and a few bad shots gobbled him up, and the four-time major champion dropped four shots in five holes.
The afternoon wave was entirely wiped out by high winds and a mid-round deluge, so what everyone hopes won’t happen at an Open, happened.
Having barely made the cut, Jordan Spieth moaned about “sheets of water moving sideways” as he stood at the 16th tee.
Holman, 25, racked up a triple bogey and, despite gallantly making birdie on the last in darkness, fell two shots short of a weekend tee time.
Lowry did his best, in the driving rain and 20mph winds, to get his challenge back on track after a sorry opening 78 but a 71 was not enough. For most, not named Mickelson, their experience of these two days could be summed up by Dickens in A Tale of Two Cities, “it was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” all in a 24-hour period. I made one or two bad swings that led to bogeys. Rain was a constant throughout the day, but it didn’t seem to bother the players too much as a number of pros went under par for the round. He took two shots to get the ball out, only to see it roll into another bunker in front of him.
He also knew it wasn’t going to be a procession, and emerging out of the in-out gloom came Sweden’s Henrik Stenson with a six-under 65 that was remarkable given the conditions, trimming Mickelson’s three-shot lead to one with two rounds left. “But that’s what you expect”. He also matched his best 36-hole total in a major (the others were at the 2001 and 2005 PGA Championships).
The storm did have one small benefit.
Spieth had to grind hard to make the cut, as did almost all of those who teed off in the afternoon. But they are only playing for money now.
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“I haven’t been in contention for the last six majors and it was a big, big goal of mine to try and be up there and give myself a chance”, said the 40-year-old as he hunts down his first major title. There is no point starting to think about outcome at this stage, really. I feel like I’ve played well. He had to hack out of the hay back into the fairway, and then hit his next shot back into the hay. “So I don’t see why there’s any reason why I can’t continue that not just this week but for years”.
