SAN DIEGO — Sam Ryder extended his lead to three shots in the Farmers Insurance Open with a 4-under 68 in challenging wind in the second round Thursday on Torrey Pines’ South Course while Jon Rahm had an eagle and three straight birdies late in his 5-under 67 on the easier North Course to get under the cut line.
Ryder survived both the Santa Ana wind and the tougher South Course with just one bogey to reach 12-under 132 and take a three-stroke lead over Brendan Steele, who shot a 70 on the South Course. Tano Goya was two more shots back after a 67 on the North Course.
The Santa Ana wind blowing out of the desert and down the mountains raked the course most of the day, with gusts up to 30 mph. It sent leaves, branches and even a tumbleweed onto greens, and cardboard trash cans tumbling down hillsides.
“Yesterday was very easy, today was very hard,” said Rahm, who took his first tour win here in 2017 and then won the 2021 U.S. Open on the blufftop municipal course overlooking the Pacific Ocean. “It’s never easy out here on either one of the courses, especially the South, and when you get poa annua bumpy greens with this wind, it can be a bit of a nightmare, so glad I made a few.”
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Rahm, ranked No. 3 in the world and looking to win for the third time three starts this year, rebounded from an opening 73 on the South Course by getting hot on his back nine. He eagled the par-5 fifth and then had three straight birdies. He had another eagle chance on the par-4 seventh but his long putt caught the left edge and skidded about a foot away.
After his frustrating opening round, “anything in the 60s would have been amazing,” Rahm said. “What I shot today, man, I’m going to be skipping out of the golf course today because it’s a great round of golf.”
Rahm, who won The American Express last weekend, started on the back nine and opened with consecutive birdies but bogeyed his third and ninth holes. He was even going into the par-5 fifth, when he started his run with an eagle.
“Holes five through nine, with or without wind is where you can take advantage of the course,” the Spanish star said. “Luckily, I’ve been hitting it really good. There’s no difference between those holes or any other five, four holes you can pick throughout the round, it’s just kind of guessed with the wind right in all of them. I think maybe I was a little more aggressive after that second shot on 6 and got in the mentality of making birdies instead of being a little tentative, which is easy to do when it’s blowing as hard as it was blowing today.”
Rahm, who went from tied for 116th on Wednesday to tied for 14th, said the cut line never came to mind.
“I was playing with the mindset of catching up to the leaders as much as possible, that’s it.”
Ryder, a 33-year-old who has never won on the PGA Tour, opened some distance after sharing the first-round lead with Aaron Rai and Brent Grant. Grant was in a group of six at 6 under.
“Yeah, it feels great. The thing I’ve been kind of telling myself is to just try and embrace it,” Ryder said. “It’s not a position that I’ve been in a lot, you know, so just trying to enjoy it. It’s kind of why we play, so just trying to look around and enjoy the moment.
“And I’m just doing everything pretty solid. It starts off the tee for me, I’m driving it well. My iron play is really good, so I feel like if I put it in the fairway, I can attack. And I don’t think I really missed many shots today. I missed a couple fairways, but the irons have been really good.”
Will Zalatoris, ranked No. 7 in the world, missed the cut after shooting 5-over 77 on the South Course.
The final two rounds will be on the South Course.
Farmers Insurance Open
La Jolla, Calif.; Purse: $8.7M
a-Torrey Pines South: 7,765 yds, par 72
b-Torrey Pines North: 7,258 yds, par 72
Second round, Thursday
Sam Ryder 64b-68a — 132 -12
Brendan Steele 65b-70a — 135 -9
Tano Goya 70a-67b — 137 -7
Brent Grant 64b-74a — 138 -6
Max Homa 68b-70a — 138 -6
Taylor Montgomery 67a-71b — 138 -6
Vincent Norrman 67a-71b — 138 -6
Sam Stevens 66a-72b — 138 -6
Sahith Theegala 66b-72a — 138 -6
Jason Day 68b-71a — 139 -5
Ben Griffin 67a-72b — 139 -5
Collin Morikawa 67b-72a — 139 -5
Andrew Novak 66a-73b — 139 -5
Byeong Hun An 68b-72a — 140 -4
Joseph Bramlett 69a-71b — 140 -4
Taylor Moore 72a-68b — 140 -4
Jon Rahm 73a-67b — 140 -4
Callum Tarren 71a-69b — 140 -4
Jimmy Walker 69a-71b — 140 -4
Dean Burmester 71a-70b — 141 -3
Stephan Jaeger 69a-72b — 141 -3
Seonghyeon Kim 67b-74a — 141 -3
Augusto Nunez 72a-69b — 141 -3
Cameron Champ 70a-72b — 142 -2
Wyndham Clark 68b-74a — 142 -2
Lanto Griffin 67b-75a — 142 -2
Emiliano Grillo 72a-70b — 142 -2
Garrick Higgo 66b-76a — 142 -2
Sungjae Im 68a-74b — 142 -2
Si Woo Kim 69a-73b — 142 -2
Luke List 67b-75a — 142 -2
Ryan Palmer 71b-71a — 142 -2
Aaron Rai 64b-78a — 142 -2
Justin Thomas 68a-74b — 142 -2
Davis Thompson 71a-71b — 142 -2
Keegan Bradley 70a-73b — 143 -1
Thomas Detry 68b-75a — 143 -1
Paul Haley 68b-75a — 143 -1
Harry Higgs 66b-77a — 143 -1
Michael Kim 69b-74a — 143 -1
Satoshi Kodaira 68b-75a — 143 -1
Peter Malnati 69b-74a — 143 -1
Hideki Matsuyama 70b-73a — 143 -1
Maverick McNealy 69b-74a — 143 -1
Seung-Yul Noh 70b-73a — 143 -1
Justin Rose 73a-70b — 143 -1
Xander Schauffele 72b-71a — 143 -1
Kevin Streelman 73a-70b — 143 -1
Justin Suh 68b-75a — 143 -1
Jhonattan Vegas 68b-75a — 143 -1
Trevor Werbylo 71a-72b — 143 -1
Gary Woodland 66b-77a — 143 -1
Kevin Yu 73a-70b — 143 -1
Erik Barnes 72b-72a — 144 E
Scott Brown 69b-75a — 144 E
Austin Cook 74b-70a — 144 E
Zecheng Dou 70a-74b — 144 E
Tony Finau 73a-71b — 144 E
Rickie Fowler 72a-72b — 144 E
Dylan Frittelli 70a-74b — 144 E
Adam Hadwin 70a-74b — 144 E
Nick Hardy 71a-73b — 144 E
Scott Harrington 74a-70b — 144 E
Adam Long 71b-73a — 144 E
Trey Mullinax 71a-73b — 144 E
Taylor Pendrith 69b-75a — 144 E
Scott Piercy 69a-75b — 144 E
Adam Schenk 71a-73b — 144 E
Taiga Semikawa 74a-70b — 144 E
Robby Shelton 70a-74b — 144 E
Alex Smalley 71a-73b — 144 E
Michael Thompson 69a-75b — 144 E
Kevin Tway 72a-72b — 144 E
Missed Cut
Aaron Baddeley 71b-74a — 145 +1
Jonathan Byrd 73a-72b — 145 +1
Doug Ghim 77a-68b — 145 +1
Patton Kizzire 70a-75b — 145 +1
Justin Lower 73a-72b — 145 +1
Matthew NeSmith 73a-72b — 145 +1
Henrik Norlander 70b-75a — 145 +1
Sean O’Hair 69b-76a — 145 +1
Austin Smotherman 75a-70b — 145 +1
Scott Stallings 72a-73b — 145 +1
Robert Streb 70b-75a — 145 +1
Kyle Westmoreland 70a-75b — 145 +1
Will Zalatoris 68b-77a — 145 +1
Hayden Buckley 66b-80a — 146 +2
Eric Cole 72a-74b — 146 +2
Nicolas Echavarria 70b-76a — 146 +2
Austin Eckroat 71a-75b — 146 +2
Harry Hall 71a-75b — 146 +2
Lee Hodges 70a-76b — 146 +2
Beau Hossler 73a-73b — 146 +2
Hank Lebioda 72a-74b — 146 +2
Patrick Rodgers 69b-77a — 146 +2
Adam Svensson 74b-72a — 146 +2
Dylan Wu 68b-78a — 146 +2
Carl Yuan 72a-74b — 146 +2
Tyson Alexander 72b-75a — 147 +3
Michael Block 74b-73a — 147 +3
Trevor Cone 71b-76a — 147 +3
Tyler Duncan 76a-71b — 147 +3
Cole Hammer 71a-76b — 147 +3
Michael Herrera 72b-75a — 147 +3
Martin Laird 72a-75b — 147 +3
Danny Lee 71a-76b — 147 +3
Brandon Matthews 71b-76a — 147 +3
Sebastian Munoz 73b-74a — 147 +3
Keita Nakajima 69b-78a — 147 +3
Cameron Percy 75a-72b — 147 +3
Davis Riley 69b-78a — 147 +3
Will Gordon 72b-76a — 148 +4
Cody Gribble 71b-77a — 148 +4
Bill Haas 71b-77a — 148 +4
James Hahn 72b-76a — 148 +4
Charley Hoffman 68b-80a — 148 +4
Ben Martin 70b-78a — 148 +4
Kevin Roy 71b-77a — 148 +4
J.J. Spaun 70b-78a — 148 +4
Brian Stuard 70b-78a — 148 +4
Martin Trainer 74a-74b — 148 +4
Zac Blair 71b-78a — 149 +5
William McGirt 72b-77a — 149 +5
Matthias Schmid 73b-76a — 149 +5
Joey Vrzich 69b-80a — 149 +5
Nick Watney 72b-77a — 149 +5
Patrick Welch 73a-76b — 149 +5
Jason Dufner 77a-73b — 150 +6
Harrison Endycott 70b-80a — 150 +6
Doc Redman 72b-78a — 150 +6
Ben Taylor 70b-80a — 150 +6
Carson Young 74a-76b — 150 +6
Ryan Armour 76a-75b — 151 +7
Harris English 76a-75b — 151 +7
Michael Gligic 77a-74b — 151 +7
Kurt Kitayama 77a-74b — 151 +7
Caleb Surratt 74a-77b — 151 +7
Richy Werenski 72b-79a — 151 +7
Anders Albertson 75b-77a — 152 +8
Brice Garnett 72b-80a — 152 +8
Jim Herman 72b-80a — 152 +8
Philip Knowles 72b-80a — 152 +8
Camilo Villegas 75a-77b — 152 +8
J.B. Holmes 70b-83a — 153 +9
Harrison Kingsley 74b-79a — 153 +9
Rory Sabbatini 74a-79b — 153 +9
Ryan Brehm 77a-77b — 154 +10
MJ Daffue 69b-85a — 154 +10
Robert Garrigus 75b-79a — 154 +10
Kyle Stanley 72b-82a — 154 +10
Ben Crane 76a-79b — 155 +11
Cameron Davis 79a-76b — 155 +11
Arjun Atwal 80a-76b — 156 +12
Kelly Kraft 80a-76b — 156 +12
Spencer Levin 76a-80b — 156 +12
David Lingmerth 75a-81b — 156 +12
