Freddy Schott and Alejandro Del Rey have opened their Bapco Energies Bahrain Championship in style, each recording a 65 to tie atop the leaderboard after the first round at Royal Golf Club.
Related: Laurie Canter excited to defend Bahrain title
Spaniard Del Rey has yet to miss a cut on what is his fifth start of the 2026 DP World Tour campaign and he continued his rich vein of form in the third tournament of the International Swing.
Del Rey, who earlier this week celebrated the one-year anniversary of his maiden title at this level at the Ras Al Khaimah Championship, set the initial clubhouse target thanks to five birdies on the front nine and two more on his way home.
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He was later joined by Germany’s Schott who ended his roller coaster round with a closing birdie-eagle to share the lead at seven under, ahead of a logjammed leaderboard which saw 28 players sit within four shots.
Schott, starting on the back nine, had powered his way into the chasing pack following an outrageous start of six birdies from his opening seven holes. The 24-year-old slipped back with a double bogey at the first before bouncing back with a birdie at the fourth. He dropped another shot at the seventh, but holed putts from 17 and 13 feet at the eighth and ninth respectively for a birdie-eagle finish and a share of the lead.
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Defending champion Laurie Canter reinforced his love of desert golf, carding a 66. He offset a bogey on the seventh with a birdie on the ninth, the Englishman’s 18th hole, to finish in a share for third.
He was joined by New Zealand’s Daniel Hillier, Sweden’s Niklas Lemke, Germany’s Nicolai Von Dellingshausen and India’s Shubhankar Sharma at six-under par. Meanwhile, last week’s winner Patrick Reed finished further back in the field after battling the wind with an opening round 71.
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Ten players will return to finish their first round on Friday morning at 07:15 local time after play was suspended due to darkness at 17:25.
Player quotes
Freddy Schott: It was really good, especially the start. It started off well and finished well, so I’m very pleased.
We started the round nicely with driving the green on 10 and got it going with a long putt on 12 and then used both par 5s. We hit a good shot in on 15 and 16, so it was really good.
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I just tried to stay focused. We were still up there, so I just tried to pull it together again and hit my comfortable shots. For me personally, it was a little fairway-finder fade and that got me back in it quite quick.
Coming out of the bunker there on nine, it was a really good shot in and a good putt to finish.
