{"id":899344,"date":"2026-09-17T15:54:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T15:54:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/899344\/"},"modified":"2026-09-17T15:54:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T15:54:10","slug":"rory-mcilroys-opening-round-unravels-at-bmw-pga-championship-despite-fast-start-at-wentworth-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/899344\/","title":{"rendered":"Rory McIlroy\u2019s opening round unravels at BMW PGA Championship despite fast start at Wentworth \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/rory-mcilroy\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/rory-mcilroy\/\">Rory McIlroy<\/a> got off to a flying start in the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth, but his round unravelled to leave fellow major champion Aaron Rai as the early clubhouse leader.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">McIlroy was five-under through 10 and in the outright lead before some waywardness off the tee proved costly coming home, making three bogeys over his final six holes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">US PGA champion Rai \u2013 playing alongside the Masters winner, and Open champion Ryan Fox in the marquee group \u2013 was typically more solid. He also had five birdies in his first 10 holes, with one bogey, and two more coming home saw him post a six-under 66. It left him three strokes ahead of McIlroy and two ahead of Fox.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">McIlroy, who covered the course in 60 during Wednesday\u2019s pro-am, is trying to reel in Patrick Reed to win a record-equalling eighth <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/dp-world-tour\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/dp-world-tour\/\">Race to Dubai<\/a> title. The Northern Irishman looked intent on making a statement here, with the American in the preceding group.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Starting at the ninth, all but one of McIlroy\u2019s first five birdies came from inside two-and-a-half feet, a 20-footer on the par-five 12th the only exception, with three in a row from the 16th from a combined five feet five inches.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">He left an eagle attempt frustratingly short at the 17th, and another for birdie at the second, but things started to go awry from there.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">McIlroy bogeyed the third and sixth, but a good recovery at the fourth saw him make birdie, and he salvaged par at the seventh.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">However, from deep rough after another poor drive at the eighth, he hacked into the pond guarding the green and dropped his third shot of the day to finish with a three-under 69.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Rai drove into the same pond at the eighth but chipped up to save par.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Reed had briefly held a share of the lead with a fifth birdie before he too fell foul of the 395-yard par-four eighth to finish on four-under, joined by Fox and Viktor Hovland.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Fresh from his win at the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/irish-open\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/irish-open\/\">Irish Open<\/a> in Doonbeg last weekend, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/shane-lowry\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/shane-lowry\/\">Shane Lowry<\/a> finished on one-under. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rory McIlroy got off to a flying start in the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth, but his round&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":899345,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[443],"tags":[49,48,104706,622,1976,1973,82],"class_list":["post-899344","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-dp-world-tour","tag-golf","tag-rory-mcilroy","tag-shane-lowry","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/899344","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=899344"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/899344\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/899345"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=899344"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=899344"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=899344"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}