PGA Championship 2026: Justin Rose rallies, says of iron switch: 'I won't be doing anything stupid'

TL;DR

Justin Rose shot a 65 in the third round of the 2026 PGA Championship, leading the field with improved iron play after switching to McLaren clubs. He expressed confidence in his game and dismissed concerns about making drastic changes.

Key points

Justin Rose shot a 65 in the third round of the PGA Championship
He leads the field with three strokes gained in approach play
Rose switched to McLaren clubs after the Masters
He expressed confidence in his game and dismissed drastic changes
Chris Kirk and Kristoffer Reitan also scored 65s

Mentioned in this story

McLaren

Justin RosePGA Championship 2026Chris KirkKristoffer Reitan

NEWPORT SQUARE, Pa. — Less than 24 hours ago, we—and by "we," I mean "I"—analyzed Justin Rose's iron game both before and after his change to McLaren following the Masters, and we found a pretty big discrepancy. A day later, it's a good thing I mentioned the possibility of a small sample size because Rose posted a 65 in the third round of the PGA Championship to move to two under and currently leads the entire field with three strokes gained in approach for the day.

Rose’s round, complete with five birdies on the front nine alone, punctuated a scorching early wave filled with more birdies than Aronimink had seen in the previous two rounds. Chris Kirk and Kristoffer Reitan also posted 65s).

What changed? Was it inevitable that his irons would click into gear, and that the narrative of him making some drastic, disastrous change to tank the sunset of Rose’s career was overblown?

"I'm very confident. I'm very experienced. I'm very curious. I'm very detail-oriented," Rose said on Saturday. "I won't be doing anything stupid."

"I know these things are great," he added about the irons that he's been designing for not days, or weeks, or even months, but years. "I've worked really hard on the process. Yeah, it was good to kind of play well today and see the evidence of that statistically, I suppose."

As to what made Saturday different, Rose simply chalked it up to bad play generally in the last few weeks—"if you put a poor move on it, I don't care what you're playing."

On a course that's playing more than a half-stroke under par on the day, following two days of playing more than two strokes over par, Rose was a red-hot early beneficiary, reeling off four straight birdies between holes 3 and 7, with putts ranging from 19 inches to 11 feet thanks to the accuracy of his approach shots. He added another on the par-5 ninth and then played even on the back to cruise in with his 65.

On Friday, Rose made eagle on his last hole to make the cut, and he said afterward that the trampoline effect from snatching two more days of golf from the jaws of an early exit paid dividends.