US PGA :: Round two in short

Day the current co-leader

Before thunderstorms halted play early on Friday, two Aussies sit atop the leaderboard at the US PGA Championship on nine-under-par – Jason Day and Matt Jones.

Barring a disaster when he resumes his second round on the 15th hole, it will signal that Day has been at or within three strokes of the lead in nine of his last ten major rounds, as he continues to pursue his maiden major title.

Five-under for his second round up until the suspension, Day said: “I just somehow got through it, which is fantastic. I have a putt on 15 to get to ten-under so we’ll see how it goes tomorrow. We’ve got some scoring holes and some tough ones to finish on, but I’m real happy to be done.”

Spieth creeps up

Before the Friday afternoon starters had got their rounds underway, an increasing familiar name was alongside Dustin Johnson at the top of the leaderboard on six-under-par: Jordan Spieth.

The 22-year-old shot five-under, which followed up his battling 71 in tough afternoon conditions on Thursday, and he was pleased with the position he put himself in.

“It was definitely gettable today,” said Spieth. “I got off to a good start making birdie on my second hole, and then the one on 18 was a great spark to get things going, get a little confidence, a little pep in my step.”

Rory targets a low one

Comfortably making the cut with two rounds of 71, it’s been a pretty acceptable start for Rory in his first tournament since the US Open eight weeks ago.

The world No.1 is currently seven shots behind co-leaders Day and Jones, but believes he does have a low round in him to haul himself right into contention at the weekend.

“I felt like I played good in parts, drove the ball pretty well again but maybe my iron play wasn’t quite as good as it was yesterday,” said McIlroy. “But there’s still enough good stuff to give me encouragement and make me feel that I can shoot a low one tomorrow and get myself back into it.”

Here’s the four-time major winner with one of the shots of the day, a chip-in eagle on the par-5 second…

Woods struggling to make cut

Resuming his second round on the 14th, Woods has five holes to shoot two-under-par and make it to the weekend.

His second round started well enough with back-to-back birdies at the second and third, but a costly double-bogey at the fourth was a setback the 14-time major winner couldn’t respond from, with another bogey at the eighth dropping him back to four-over-par.

With two strokes to make up on the tougher side of the back nine, if he fails, it’ll be the third consecutive major that the 39-year-old has missed the cut.

Iwata joins the 63 club

What a difference a day made for Hiroshi Iwata. After struggling to a five-over-par 77 with no birdies on Thursday, he became the latest member of the 63 club at Whistling Straits on Friday after a flawless round which included eight birdies and an eagle.

Iwata is the 27th player to shoot a 63 in major championship history, with Jason Dufner the last player to do so at the US PGA Championship in 2013. He went on to win that year…

Fun for Phil

After another scrappy round, Mickelson has made it to the weekend – but only just on one-over-par.

But never mind that, what you all wanted to see was the 45-year-old sliding down a steep hill, before walking off like we were all just seeing things…