Ludvig Aberg goes low to lead RBC Heritage by one stroke

The Swede was consistent in the benign conditions at Hilton Head, carding a flawless eight under 63 to finish ahead of Hovland and English, while a host of others are on six under, including Matthew Fitzpatrick and Rickie Fowler.

Aberg made the turn in three under, then went on a birdie blitz on the back nine. His 8-iron to about 15 feet on the back corner of the green on the par three 17th resulted in the birdie that gave him the solo lead.

But Aberg still had the Masters on his mind, where he finished in T21, not reaching his expectations.

"I felt like I was playing well but made some silly mistakes that prevented me from having a real chance," he told the press on Thursday.

"But I also felt like in the grand scheme of things, I was swinging it nice, I was moving it nice, so I didn't have to prepare that much in terms of my golf swing on Monday through Wednesday, and I felt like good golf was in there."

Meanwhile, Hovland was happy to see his efforts off the course translate to a low score during competition.

"The whole year I've been working really hard, and I think now that I'm seeing my game progress and get closer to where I want it to be, I can start to relax a little bit more and focus on kind of the recovery aspect of things," said the Norwegian, who is still searching for a top ten finish after eight starts in 2026.

Further down the leaderboard, world number one Scottie Scheffler recovered to shoot a 68, five behind the leader. He was out of bounds with his first tee shot but managed to scramble a bogey. He dropped another shot on the par three seventh, but five birdies buoyed him.