Jon Rahm Survives a Messy Front Nine, Takes the LIV Mexico City Lead Anyway, and Keeps Acting Like This League Is His Side Quest

Jon Rahm took the 36-hole lead at LIV Golf Mexico City with a 67 on Friday, got to 10 under, and once again made the entire league feel like his personal inconvenience.

That is not even really an insult to everybody else. It is just the rhythm of this thing now.

According to the Round 2 recap distributed Friday night, Rahm survived a sloppy front side, flipped the round on the back nine, and heads into the weekend one shot clear of Matthew Wolff, Tom McKibbin, and Harold Varner III.

Rahm looked human for a while, which was nice while it lasted

The funniest part of the round is that it did not even start well.

Rahm opened with a bogey, played the front nine in even par, dumped one in the water at No. 8, and for a moment looked like he might actually let somebody else run with this.

Then the back nine happened.

He birdied the 10th, stayed clean the rest of the way, and turned a weird round into a very Rahm round, controlled, opportunistic, slightly mean, and good enough to end the day on top.

He is now chasing his second win of 2026 and, per the round recap, a sixth straight top-five finish to open the season. That is the kind of consistency that makes a rival want to throw a wedge into a lake.

The chasing pack is decent, but it still feels like Rahm’s board

The leaderboard behind him is not bad at all.

• Jon Rahm -10
• Matthew Wolff -9
• Tom McKibbin -9
• Harold Varner III -9
• Luis Masaveu -8
• Victor Perez -7
• Tyrrell Hatton -7
• Richard T. Lee -7

Wolff’s round might actually be the most interesting one outside of Rahm. He shot a bogey-free 65 despite admitting the ball-striking felt a bit loose, which is either encouraging or terrifying depending on how much you enjoy volatility.

McKibbin and Varner are close enough to matter. Masaveu is hanging around. Victor Perez, after that electric opening 62, cooled off with a 2-over round and slid back into the pack.

That is the danger of Mexico City golf. The place can make you look invincible one day and slightly drunk the next.

Bryson finally looked mortal again

One of the bigger notes from Friday was Bryson DeChambeau staying flat.

He shot his second straight even-par 71 and is way back in a tie for 31st. For a guy trying to become the first LIV player to win three straight individual events, that is a pretty rude comedown.

Honestly, the league probably would have loved that storyline. Instead, Rahm is right back where Rahm always seems to be, in charge.

Mexico City is still doing altitude nonsense

The event remains a weird mix of great players and cartoon physics.

High altitude at Club de Golf Chapultepec keeps warping the scorecards, and Friday’s moves showed that again. Marc Leishman shot the low round of the day with a 64, including two eagles, after opening with a 74. So yes, this leaderboard is still one hot stretch away from getting very stupid very fast.

Which is fun. To be clear.

But it also means Rahm having the lead after a messy start matters even more. He did not need perfect golf to get there. He just needed the field to blink and his own back nine to stop screwing around.

The actual takeaway

LIV had a genuine first-round surprise in Victor Perez.

By Friday night, the event felt more familiar again.

Rahm is leading. Bryson is not. The chasing group is talented enough to keep the weekend watchable, but the whole thing still feels like it bends toward Rahm unless somebody actually takes it from him.

That is what makes him so annoying in this format. He does not need to dominate every round. He just keeps showing up at the top by the time it matters.

And if LIV is desperate for stability while every off-course rumor keeps buzzing around the product, having Rahm sit on the top line going into the weekend is about as safe a headline as the league can ask for.

For more LIV context, read Victor Perez’s Round 1 surge in Mexico City, the bigger league backdrop in LIV says it’s fine, which is exactly why the rumors feel real, and the recent form line in Bryson DeChambeau wins LIV Golf Singapore.