Royal Birkdale has spent three days quietly rewriting how firm and fast a links course can play in a heatwave. On Friday, Lucas Herbert and Sam Burns both shot 62, tying the lowest round in men’s major championship history within twenty minutes of each other. On Saturday, Ryan Fox went out in the morning wave, made nine birdies against a single bogey, and shot the same number. It is the third 62 recorded on this course in less than 48 hours, and by Saturday evening even the players had mostly stopped pretending to be surprised by it.
Fox’s front nine, and the finish that nearly went lower still
Fox, a 39-year-old New Zealander playing alongside Xander Schauffele, made the turn in a five-under 29, the kind of nine holes that tends to happen to other people. A bogey at the 13th was the only blemish on an otherwise flawless card, and he answered it with three more birdies at the 14th, 16th and 17th to arrive at the 18th tee needing a par for 62 and a birdie for the first 61 in the history of men’s major championship golf.
His tee shot found the right fairway bunker, not the start anyone plans for a shot at history. From an awkward stance, Fox thumped his approach clear of the lip by what looked like inches and watched it settle on the front-right of the green, a recovery the watching commentary team had all but written off before he played it. The putt that would have made him a certainty stayed above ground; his 40-footer for 61 slid five feet by on the low side. Fox rolled in the comebacker for par and a 62, becoming the eighth player to shoot the number in a men’s major and the third to do it this week alone.
A third record-equalling 62 at The 154th Open.
— The Open (@TheOpen) July 18, 2026
Ryan Fox writes his name in history. pic.twitter.com/PQ05HSdmNR
“When you’re out in the morning, when the wind’s down around here, there’s almost some pressure on to shoot a score,” Fox said afterwards. “I would have taken 62 on a Saturday, that’s for sure.” Asked about the bunker shot at the last, he was blunter about how close it had come to going the other way: “I was pretty happy to have that 40-footer out of the fairway trap. Didn’t hit a great first putt, but I was very happy the second one went in the middle.”
Burns goes to nine under, then gives most of it back
The afternoon belonged, briefly, to Sam Burns. Four birdies in his first eight holes carried him to nine under and the outright lead, one clear of the mark Fox had posted hours earlier from the clubhouse. It did not last. A three-putt bogey at the 9th, after missing the green long, ended the run, and further shots went missing over the closing stretch as the pressure of protecting a major lead asserted itself. Burns finished his round at five under, in a group with Bryson DeChambeau and Si Woo Kim that had looked, for about twenty minutes on Saturday afternoon, like it might contain the tournament leader.
DeChambeau’s own week took an unusual turn on Friday evening, when officials assessed him a two-shot penalty after video showed he had improved his line of play by trampling down fescue at the 5th hole. Rory McIlroy, who was watching from the players’ lounge when it happened, had no issue with the ruling itself but was less diplomatic about DeChambeau’s reaction to it, telling reporters he thought much of it was “performative” and “for attention.” McIlroy’s own Saturday brought a chip-in eagle at the 9th and a closing 69 that got him to two under with a round to play, a position from which the Masters champion will need something close to his best golf on Sunday to have a say in the outcome.
Where that leaves Sunday
Fox and Herbert head into the final round sharing the 54-hole lead at eight under, Herbert having steadied himself after an early bogey at the 3rd with a scrambling par save at the 4th and a birdie at the 7th that carried him back to his overnight number. Jackson Suber, Cameron Young and Ryan Gerard sit two back at six under, with Burns, DeChambeau and Si Woo Kim a shot further behind at five under. Scottie Scheffler, defending his title, is part of a cluster at four under alongside Tommy Fleetwood and Jon Rahm, close enough that nobody at Royal Birkdale is treating Sunday as a two-man contest. Given what this course has produced in three days already, betting against a fourth 62 feels like the riskier position to hold.