POTOMOC, United States: Sweden’s David Lingmerth shot a second consecutive five-under 65 for a two-stroke lead over Australian Geoff Ogilvy after the second round of the Quicken Loans National on Friday.
World number 99 Lingmerth, whose only PGA Tour victory came at the 2015 Memorial Tournament, birdied three of his first five holes at TPC Potomac in Maryland en route to a round that matched Ogilvy for the day’s lowest score.
Lingmerth won here on the developmental Web.com Tour five years ago and once again enjoyed stellar ball-striking as he hit 10 of 14 fairways and 13 of 18 greens in regulation to double his overnight lead.
“I feel like that’s kind of one of my strengths, a thing I pride myself in, hitting a lot of fairways,” said Lingmerth. “I like this type of golf course when you can see the definition. You can zone in on your targets. You’ve really got to stay committed off the tee.”
TPC Potomac is hosting the event for the first time and has been redesigned since it last welcomed the PGA Tour in 2006. As a result, Lingmerth, who does not have a top-10 finish on the PGA Tour all year, is more familiar with the course than most and has happy memories to draw from.
World number nine Rickie Fowler (72), the highest-ranked player in the field, was 12 shots off the pace after a round in which his only blemishes were bogeys at the par-four sixth and 18th holes.
Former US Open champion Ogilvy, who has fallen from a career-high third in the world rankings to 231st, started from the 10th tee and birdied three of his first four holes en route to a bogey-free 65. “Very nice to get off to a start like that,” said Ogilvy, who has eight PGA tour wins but only two since 2009. “You kind of want to get under before you get over on a course like this because it’s kind of hard to catch up because it kind of beats you over the head all day.” — Reuters
US PGA National scores
Top scores after Friday’s second round (par-70, USA unless noted):
130 - David Lingmerth (SWE) 65-65
132 - Geoff Ogilvy (AUS) 67-65
134 - Daniel Summerhays 66-68
135 - Arjun Atwal (IND) 68-67, Kang Sung (KOR) 66-69
136 - Nick Taylor (CAN) 66-70, Ricky Barnes 68-68
137 - Harris English 70-67, Johnson Wagner 66-71
138 - Michael Kim 69-69, Tyrone Van Aswegan (RSA) 72-66, Danny Lee (NZL) 70-68, Kyle Reifers 70-68, Bryson DeChambeau 67-71, Marc Leishman (AUS) 66-72
139 - Andrew Loupe 70-69, Keegan Bradley 71-68, Patrick Reed 67-72, Bill Haas 69-70, Peter Malnati 72-67, Martin Laird (SCO) 67-72, Curtis Luck (AUS) 68-71
140 - Jason Kokrak 72-68, Charles Howell 71-69, James Hahn 67-73, Kyle Stanley 70-70, Kevin Streelman 68-72, Spencer Levin 70-70, Cameron Percy (AUS) 70-70, Sam Saunders 68-72
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