Rory McIlroy Shares Lead at BMW Championship

CHERRY HILLS VILLAGE, Colo. - Rory McIlroy was lining up his second shot, a putt from off the green, on the par-4 second hole at Cherry Hills Country Club on Thursday when a duck emerged from the lake to the left of the green, flapped its wings and, between pecks at the grass, craned its neck in McIlroy's direction, as if angling for a better look.

Oblivious to his fine-feathered fan and all the other eyes upon him, McIlroy stepped up and drained the putt for the fourth of five birdies in his round of three-under-par 67 at the BMW Championship.

McIlroy, the world No. 1, dropped two strokes on his final three holes to share the lead with Gary Woodland and Jordan Spieth. Nine players, including Henrik Stenson, who briefly joined the leaders at three-under, did not finish their rounds before play was called because of lightning in the area.

McIlroy, 25, and Spieth, 21, are among the 16 players in the 69-man field who were not born the last time a non-senior PGA Tour event came to Cherry Hills, for the 1985 P.G.A. Championship (Webb Simpson was born the first day of the event, which Hubert Green won).

Before the first ball was struck, the popular story line was that Cherry Hills, a 7,000-yard-plus layout designed in 1922 by William Flynn, the architect behind Shinnecock Hills, was a defenseless geriatric icon bound to be bullied by the McIlroy-led baby bombers.

Instead, Cherry Hills used its ageless tools - thick rough, fast greens, cool temperatures and an overcast sky that opened toward the round's end - to push back. Only 21 players broke par and no one threatened the score of 59 that one writer on Wednesday had thrown out to McIlroy as a viable goal.

Phil Mickelson, who won the 1990 United States Amateur on the course, was in a group of seven at even par. He needs to finish fourth or better to advance to next week's Tour Championship, which he has played in each of the past seven years.

'These greens have gotten so much firmer over the last 24 hours,' said McIlroy, who had predicted the course might wield scores as low as 63 or 64 in optimal conditions. 'It's really made a huge difference.'

With little time to adjust to a new course and the mile-high altitude, McIlroy could not complain about his start. 'I just tried to play a little bit more off of feel and it seemed to work pretty good,' he said, adding, 'A 67 is a really good start, even though it could have been a bit better.'

McIlroy, third in the FedEx Cup standings, added to the belief that Cherry Hills would not be able to muster much of a defense when he casually mentioned that one of his 3-wood shots in a practice round traveled 370 yards in the thin air. That set up the first hole, a par 4 that measured 353 yards, a low-hanging fruit for eagles.

McIlroy's 3-wood on the hole traveled 348 yards but landed in the rough, pin high. He chipped to 21 feet and holed his birdie attempt. That was fun, but then came the last five holes, which McIlroy played like a fighter on the ropes.

He salvaged pars at Nos. 5 and 6 with testy putts, made a bogey at No. 7 after his drive found the rough and his second shot landed in a greenside bunker, and made bogey at No. 8 after failing to get up and down from a bunker.

'I was pretty hot going to the ninth tee,' McIlroy said.

Woodland, 30, who was playing two groups ahead of McIlroy, was thrilled to get out of Round 1 of his fight with Cherry Hills with only one bruise, a bogey at No. 4 after his tee shot found the rough.

'This is about as hard a golf course as I've seen so far,' Woodland said, adding, 'Obviously a new golf course, the altitude, trying to judge how far the ball is going, it's cooler now than it has been all week; it's a big adjustment.'

Spieth is the youngest in the field, but unlike almost all of his elders, he has squared off against Cherry Hills. In 2012 he played the United States Amateur and lost in the first round of match play. 'This is one of the few events where I may have more experience than a lot of guys,' Spieth said. 'So I'll take that mental attitude the next few days.'

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