Everyone knows that links golf is a different animal entirely. That is what makes what happened at the Scottish Open highly surprising.

The 2025 Genesis Scottish Open is just Chris Gotterup’s second start on links courses in his professional career. His debut was also at The Renaissance Club a year ago, and it couldn’t have gone worse, as he missed the cut by six strokes.

However, a year later, the story is completely different. Gotterup enters the weekend of the tournament as the sole leader at 11-under. But it was his second round that turned heads, tying Bernd Wiesberger’s 2019 course record (9-under 61).

Gotterup started the day in full swing, carding six bogey-free birdies on the front nine to make the turn with a 29 strokes, his PGA Tour career-low nine. He then added three more bogey-free birdies on the back nine to complete one of the best rounds of his career.

In fact, his second-round score improved his season-best by two strokes. His previous low score of the year was the 63 he carded in the first round of the Puerto Rico Open.

That performance allowed him to climb 32 spots on the leaderboard, sitting in first place. In the first round, Gotterup posted a score of 2-under with four birdies and two bogeys.

In the 2024 edition of this event, Gotterup bowed out early after carding rounds of 66 and 77 (3-over).

Gotterup wasn’t widely tipped to do well at the Scottish Open. Before traveling to Scotland, he had played 21 PGA Tour tournaments and is still searching for his first top-10 finish of the season.

Chris Gotterup: “You just take what you can get”

After the second round, Chris Gotterup evaluated his performance and explained the importance of taking advantage of good opportunities to achieve a score like his:

“I definitely played good today. Not a lot of wind in the morning which was obviously beneficial,” he said.

“But yeah, it’s funny, when it flips, you get some holes that you like and some holes that you don’t like and vice versa.”

“I think there’s definitely certain holes that feel nice. Nice three pars to finish.”

“You just take what you can get, what the course gives you.”

Gotterup will start Moving Day at 10:45 a.m. Eastern Time, grouped with Harry Hall, who is second, two strokes behind the leader.

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