Aldrich Potgieter looked on course to hold the outright lead at the halfway point of the 2026 PGA Championship until two late bogeys at Aronimink's 17th and 18th holes pushed him a couple of shots back of the new co-leaders, but the 21-year-old South African walked off the course on Friday insisting his weekend position is exactly where he wants to be.
Potgieter, who shared the first-round lead with a 67 alongside Min Woo Lee and Scottie Scheffler, refused to dwell on the closing stretch and said his bigger learning from a young career on the PGA Tour is that chasing suits him better than defending.
"It was great," Potgieter said of his round overall. "Looking at those last two holes was kind of unfortunate, but I felt like I was in control most of the round, and I had some really nice par saves that kind of kept the momentum going, so I was quite happy with it."
Asked whether the closing holes would stick with him overnight, the young South African did not blink.
"I think you kind of look at it as an aspect of, OK, sleeping on the lead, it's always good, but it's mentally probably draining for a week like this where it's so big," Potgieter said. "So being a couple of shots back kind of puts me in that position to be able to go and look for a low round instead of defend."
Potgieter drew on his Rocket Mortgage Classic experience earlier in his career, when he sat on a 54-hole lead and lost it inside the first six holes of the final round.
"That opening Sunday round was pretty hard, that first six holes, until I lost the lead and I was like, OK, if I win today, it's fine. If I don't, it's also fine. There'll be 100 other opportunities coming," he said. "It was nice for me to kind of get to that point where I lost the lead and I was like, well, now we can just go and attack again and kind of be in that position where I'm not really thinking about it too much. If we can kind of keep that mindset going for the weekend and kind of stay inside reaching range, but also attack a little bit, I think it'll be good."
Potgieter, who is set to head home for two weeks after the championship, said his expectations coming into Aronimink were modest, but a PGA Championship setup that rewards long, straight hitters has played into his hands.
"There were no big expectations to maybe winning or something like that, but it's also a lot of points for FedEx, so we definitely want to make the top 30 and top 50 at least," he said. "It's a really good week and the golf course was set up nicely for me. We just thought give myself a chance on every hole to kind of build on and have a good result at the end of the week."
The young South African will be drawn into one of Saturday's marquee pairings, where the gallery and the cameras will be heavier than anything he has experienced on the regular tour, and he expects to lean on advice from compatriot Ernie Els about handling the moment.
Aronimink's brutal greens were the great equaliser through 36 holes, with even the co-leaders well clear of the rest of the field. With weather forecast to warm and fairways already running, Potgieter believes a free-swinging weekend attack might be exactly what the course rewards.
"The weather's also looking good, so we might be able to go and get some more birdies," he said. "If we can stay inside reaching range but also attack a little bit, I think it'll be good."
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*Originally published on [Golf News](https://golfnews.global/article/aldrich-potgieter-pga-championship-2026-round-2-late-bogeys-attack-mindset). Visit for full coverage.*
