Friday was a record-breaking day at Royal St George’s
Scoring Records Tumble On Friday At The 149th Open
Despite the long rough and blustery conditions at Royal St George’s, the best players in the world showed their class on Friday at The 149th Open.
Overnight leader Louis Oosthuizen followed his first-round 64 with an equally impressive 65 to set a new 36-hole Open scoring record. His 129 total eclipsed the previous benchmark set by Nick Faldo in 1992 at Muirfield and Brandt Snedeker in 2012 at Royal Lytham and St Annes by one shot.
The South African leads by two from Collin Morikawa heading into the weekend as he looks to lift the Claret Jug for the second time.
In total, there were 63 under-par scores on Friday in Kent, which is a new record for a single round at golf’s oldest championship, beating the previous high of 50 at Turnberry in 2009.
Further down the leaderboard, the cut fell at one-over, meaning a host of major champions such as Henrik Stenson, Jimmy Walker, Francesco Molinari, Keegan Bradley and Martin Kaymer all missed out by a shot.
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At 141, it was also the lowest cut ever recorded at The Open. Eight times in the last 30 Open Championships (1990, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1996, 2006, 2011 and 2012) 143 has been the mark, with two of those coming at Royal St George’s – 1993 and 2011.
And even the amateurs were at it on the Sandwich links. In the battle for the Silver Medal, Germany’s Matthias Schmid fired an impressive second-round 65 to equal the lowest score recorded by an amateur in The Open, tying Tom Lewis who covered Royal St George’s in 65 strokes in 2011.
Schmid sits one-under after two rounds and leads Yuxin Lin – the only other amateur to make the cut – by two.
