A frustrated Patrick Reed remains the player to beat heading to the weekend rounds of CB Qatar Masters.
Reed added a second round 67 to his opening 65, moving to 12-under and a shot clear of the field competing on the Doha Golf Club course in the Qatar capital.
The past Masters champion arrived having captured the Hero Dubai Desert Classic and it should have been back-to-back wins in losing out in a play-off at last week’s Bapco Energies Bahrain Championship.
Reed is making his debut in the event also after the drama of withdrawing membership of LIV Golf but the Texan has hardly let that affect his golf, and also jumping from 44th to 29th in the world after winning in Dubai to his current ranking of 25th in the world.
A FRUSTRATED TEXAN STILL THE ONE TO BEAT …
In-form @PReedGolf admitted he being frustrated, not finding a first day two #QatarMasters fairway to 6th hole though still leading the field.
Read: https://t.co/dZzzfnVlkR
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✅ @TOURMISS pic.twitter.com/AhDRY88TEj
— Fatiha (@TOURMISS) February 6, 2026
His second round was a mix of six birdies, four of those over the sixth to 14th holes before birdies at the 16th and the final hole, and a bogey on the 14th.
“Honestly, today was a little frustrating, especially early,” said Reed.
“Didn’t hit my first fairway until six, finally had a little bit of a celebration there for hitting the fairway and next thing you know I go and birdie the hole. Ball-striking wasn’t quite as sharp as it was yesterday but I missed in the right spots today and because of that I was able still to get balls on greens.
“Going round this place and feeling like you didn’t hit it quite as well as you wanted to, and hit 17 greens is always a positive. I will go back, recover, rest and get ready for tomorrow. Towards the end the golf game started feeling pretty solid so we’re just looking forward to the weekend.
“I love the golf course. I think it’s one of these where you really have to be able to work the ball both ways and today I unfortunately had the opposite shot going to what I was trying to hit early in that round.
“Because of that there was a little bit more stress but it definitely showed that as long as you do your homework, figure out where you can miss it on this golf course, you still have an opportunity to go out and shoot a number.
“I was able to do that and get myself back up top on the leaderboard, and at the same time feel like I got some confidence on the back nine with how I was able to hit the golf ball. I’m just going to go in and approach it the same way I always have, try to start at even par with everybody and try to go win the day. If you can go and win more days than not, you’ll win the tournament at the end of the day.
“Just really go into the weekend with the same mindset, go and play the golf course and continue to give myself some good birdie looks and try to roll in some putts”.
Swede Joakim Lagergren had enjoyed the clubhouse lead at 11-under thanks to his second round 66 ahead of Reed’s last hole birdie to finish one shot better.
