Carlos Ortiz flirted with 59 but had to settle for a round of 60 that gives the Torque man a two-stroke lead after a first round at HSBC LIV Golf Hong Kong where Graeme McDowell and Tom McKibbin are seven and eight shots off the pace respectively.
McKibbin, playing on the course he earned his Masters and Open Championship exemptions through a wire-to-wire win in the Asian Tour’s Hong Kong Open back in November, only arrived on the eve of the tournament after Legion XIII team captain Jon Rahm chartered a private jet to take the Holywood man, fellow Legion XII man Caleb Surratt, and five other LIV golfers who found themselves stranded in the middle east with most flights grounded and airports closed.
Unsurprisingly, he was a little slow out of the traps and, having started on the eighth, bogeyed nine to lose ground early. He recovered to birdie the 10th and 13th, but another bogey on one saw him facing into the final six holes at level-par.
But three birdies and a bogey over that closing stretch got him into the clubhouse at two-under-par and sharing 29th place, one behind fellow countryman McDowell who is tied for 24th.
‘G-Mac’, who had no such travel issues, also began slowly and bogeyed his second hole – the 18th – but responded with three birdies-in-a-row from the second to push his way up the leaderboard.
Bogeys on nine and 15 were interspersed with birdies on 10, 13 and 14, and he sits alongside the likes of Anthony Kim, who grabbed global headlines when winning the recent LIV Adelaide, 16 years after his last professional win.
Ortiz needed to hole out from 157 yards on his final hole to shoot a magical 59, but though the odds were slim, he gave it every chance and ended up with a tap-in birdie from inside two feet that took him to 10-under-par and gave him a two-stroke lead over Dean Burmester who lies solo second.
Not only was it Ortiz’s lowest round in his professional tournament career, it was the third time in LIV Golf history that a player has shot 60. Just three rounds have been lower – Bryson DeChambeau’s historic 58, and the two 59s shot by Ortiz’s Torque GC teammates Joaquin Niemann and Sebastián Muñoz.
“It was a great round,” said Ortiz. “… I think I hit it very close, like four or five times I just tapped it in. That doesn’t happen much, so it’s awesome when you don’t even have to get the putter out. Very pleased.”
It was certainly the best round of a multitude of low scores at Fanling. Burmester’s 62 matches his score the previous round he played here, when the Southern Guards star finished second last season to Fireballs GC Captain Sergio Garcia.
Garcia, meanwhile, shot 63 while extending his streak of bogey-free holes at Hong Kong Golf Club to 63. He’s tied for third with Smash GC Captain Talor Gooch along with Scott Vincent, who shot the lowest round ever for a Wild Card player.
“As you can see by the scoring, it’s playing softer and a lot easier than it generally is,” Burmester said. “But I know Saturday and Sunday, the wind is going to come up, so I think that’ll toughen the course up. It’ll dry out and then we’ll get the true experience of Fanling.”
Rahm, who has finished runner-up in both of LIV’s previous events in 2026 and has yet to finish outside the top 11 in a LIV event since moving in late 2023, opened with a four-under 66 to share 16th place.
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