Rory McIlroy admitted he must cut out the mistakes if he’s to clinch a medal for Ireland in the Men’s Olympic Competition at Le Golf National in Paris.
On a day when Shane Lowry lamented a cold putter as he carded a second successive level par 71 that left him “playing for pride” this weekend, McIlroy spectacularly birdied the 18th to add a 69 to his opening 68.
At five-under-par, the Holywood star kept his medal hopes intact with that stroke of genius. But at tied 13th, he’s six strokes behind Hideki Matsuyama, Tommy Fleetwood and the reigning Olympic champion Xander Schauffele with little room for manoeuvre.
“A few too many mistakes,” said McIlroy, who combined the spectacular with the careless. “Sort of similar story to yesterday, making the good swings and making enough birdies and another eagle today but just offset by a few too many mistakes over the first couple days.”
Schauffele continued the hot form that brought him wins in the PGA and The Open, carding a five-under 66 to set the early target at 11-under.
He was overtaken by Matsuyama, who was five-under for the day and 13-under for the tournament, standing on the 18th tee and a shot clear of playing partner Fleetwood, who was eight-under for the day.
But both men did McIlroy a favour by falling back to 11-under — Matsuyama making a double-bogey en route to a 68 as Fleetwood made his lone bogey in an otherwise faultless 64.
They led by two strokes from Spain’s Jon Rahm, who shot 66, and by three from Korea’s Tom Kim, 2020 bronze medalist CT Pan from Chinese Taipei and Belgium’s Thomas Detry, who made eight birdies in a brilliant 63.
McIlroy looked in the mood to make a move when he hit a towering 260-yard long iron that clattered the flagstick at the 561-yard third, leaving him a five-footer he duly brushed in for eagle.
A two at the sixth saw him move to six-under, but he played the remaining holes in one-over par.
After following a three-putt bogey at the eighth with a birdie four at the ninth, he missed the 10th green with a wedge and dropped a shot, then failed to birdie the par-five 14th.
He got back to six-under with a brilliant birdie two at the 16th but double-bogeyed the tough 17th after being forced to take a penalty drop in the left rough.
He needed something special at the last to cut the gap and produced it by hitting another towering iron shot from 190 yards to just five feet.
“Yeah, it was a good shot on the last especially after the double on 17,” McIlroy said.
“Again going into those last three holes, if someone was going to tell you that you would make a double on one of them and you would play them in even par, you’d be like, well, it was okay.
“I just felt like I played better than the score suggested. Obviously, I got punished for an errant tee shot on 17 and a loose wedge shot on 10, but apart from that, I felt like it was pretty good.”
The course remains receptive and while McIlroy believes he can be aggressive at the weekend, he knows he must find fairways and hope that potentially firmer conditions on Sunday put a brake on the low scoring.
As for Lowry, he all but conceded his race is run after he made just one of nine putts in the 10-15 feet range in a 71.
“I gave myself a lot of chances, but my putter was cold, and the leaders are flying away,” said Lowry, who was tied for 43rd in the 60-man field on level par, 11 shots off the lead.
“I’ve probably given myself way too much to do, so I’m playing for pride this weekend now… The frustrating thing is I didn’t feel like I was hitting bad putts, I just struggled to read the greens.”
