Brooks Koepka leads birdie barrage Friday at PGA Championship

U.S. Open champ Brooks Koepka will go to the weekend just two off the lead held by Gary Woodland after a PGA Championship record-tying 63 on Friday.

Lightning suspended play at the PGA Championship on Friday, but before that Brooks Koepka supplied the thunder.

Koepka, the U.S. Open champion, tied the tournament scoring record with a seven-under 63 at Bellerive Country Club and is two shots behind leader Gary Woodland after his second round.

The round began quietly for Koepka. Beginning on the back-nine, he opened with three pars. Then, at the par-three 13th, he hit his approach to four feet to set up his first birdie. Two more short birdie putts on his first nine brought him to three-under for the round. He started the second nine with three straight birdies, then made another at the par-five eighth. So solid was Koepka’s iron play that he didn’t have to make a putt longer than 10 feet today.

Koepka said after the round he didn’t feel like he played any better than he did during Thursday’s one-under 69. The key, he said, was limiting his mistakes today.

“I played good. I played really good yesterday too,” he told TNT. “Played really solid. Didn’t feel like I did anything wrong. And then today, bogey-free, anytime you do that in a major championship you’ll be just fine.”

At the ninth, Koepka faced a 20-foot putt for birdie that would have matched the major championship record of 62, but it lipped off the right edge and didn’t drop. He admitted later he wasn’t thinking about the importance of the putt at the time.

“I wasn’t really thinking about that on the putt,” he said. “But right when we walked off my caddie was like, man, you could have had 62 right there. A major championship record, which would have been nice. It looked good the whole way. I thought it was in, but unfortunately it didn’t drop.”

Koepka’s score of 63 was matched later in the day by Charl Schwartzel. Nine rounds of 65 or better were shot on Friday, the most since 1983.

Woodland, the first round leader, maintained his one-shot advantage over Kevin Kisner after a four-under round of 66. He began slowly, making a birdie to offset a bogey in his first seven holes. That changed at the 17th, when his approach to the par-five settled five feet from the hole and led to an eagle. Woodland added three more birdies on the second-nine, including rolling in a 25-footer at the eighth.

Woodland’s score of 130 through 36 holes ties the PGA Championship and major championship record. He said after the round he likes the position he is in going to the weekend.