Britain's Matt Baldwin will head into the third round of the BMW PGA Championship with a two-stroke lead after matching the tournament record in the first two rounds at Wentworth in Surrey.
He opened with a 65, 13 under, and finished with a 66, tying the halfway record set in 2008 by Ireland's Paul McGinley.
Baldwin, 38, who was working as a delivery driver three years ago, said he came close to giving up the sport many times.
“I drove a truck for Amazon for three or four months just to get through the winter before the 2022 challenge,” Baldwin said.
“I learned a lot from it. I learned that there are other things you can do in life, but I also learned that I really want to play golf.”
Niklas Norgaard of Denmark was second at 11 under, with Antoine Rozner of France one stroke behind.
Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland shot 67 on the first day and 68 this round, 9 under, to finish fourth.
Play was suspended for 77 minutes because of a lightning threat earlier in the day, and Baldwin had just made par on the 16th hole from 25 feet before the alarm went off.
Baldwin was competing in the junior golf tournament alongside fellow Briton Tommy Fleetwood, who finished six shots back at seven under.
“I don't think we've ever lost. We played a lot of golf growing up, graduated from the Challenge Tour the same year and obviously played some tournaments here,” Baldwin said.
“We’re on slightly different paths, but I hope to catch up with him.”
Meanwhile, McIlroy suffered a disastrous defeat at the Irish Open this week, losing narrowly to Rasmus Hogaard and missing out on his first career home win.
“This is really important [to play well] But it’s good at the same time. If I didn’t play, I wouldn’t want to be feeling sorry for myself all week,” McIlroy said.
“It meant a lot to me to get back out on the golf course and put in some solid rounds and give myself a chance to play in another really big tournament, and I thought it was important to do that, and thankfully, I did it.”
