Sawt Falasteen - Rose: I've played well enough to win Masters but lack the jacket

Rose matched the lowest of his 71 career rounds at the Masters with a seven-under par 65 on Thursday to seize a three-stroke lead after 18 holes at Augusta National.

"I played a lot of golf here," Rose said. "So to come away with my equal best score is certainly an achievement for me."

Sweden's Ludvig Aberg, last year's runner-up in his major debut, shared second on 68 with Canada's Corey Conners and top-ranked defending champion Scottie Scheffler.

It's the fifth time Rose has led after 18 holes at the Masters, but the best he has to show for it are runner-up finishes in 2015 and 2017.

"I feel like I've played well enough to win this tournament. I just feel like I don't have the jacket to prove it," Rose said.

"It's a compliment. I've obviously played a lot of good rounds of golf here... but yeah, you know, ultimately, you want to be last man standing on Sunday."

Rose, the 2013 US Open champion, lost a playoff to Spain's Sergio Garcia in 2017 and finished four adrift of 2015 winner Jordan Spieth.

"I've had my luck on occasion and been a champion, but you've got to be playing the golf to keep creating those opportunities," Rose said. "And the only way to do that is to get your name on the leaderboard. I definitely don't shy away from it."

Rose, the 2016 Rio Olympic champion, threatened Augusta National's 18-hole course record of nine-under par 63 shared by Zimbabwe's Nick Price and Australian Greg Norman.

Rose opened with three consecutive birdies and reeled off three more in a row starting at eight.

"That's when the day felt a bit different. That's when I felt I was doing something potentially more on the special side," Rose said.

He added birdies at 15 and 16 but a closing bogey left him only level with his prior best, a 65 in the first round in 2021, when he finished seventh.

Rose has said he is in the "Indian Summer" of his career but plans to make the most of the glory days that remain.

"I'm 44. Golf is not going to get easier for me in the next five, 10 years," he said. "Your opportunity is less going forward, so you have to make the most of it."

That means filling trophy case gaps and hangers with green jackets.

"There's tons of opportunity to do things I haven't done before," he said. "I should use that as freedom to take these opportunities and use them to kind of freewheel and use it all as upside."

- 'Actually ridiculous' -

Rose, ranked 39th in the world, was delighted at his hot start.

"For the first few holes everything was going exactly where I was looking," he said. "To be three-under through three kind of really got me on the front foot and felt like I was playing great golf."

Aberg called Rose's 65 "actually ridiculous."

Rose shared second at last year's Open Championship, inspiring him to keep working hard for another major breakthrough.

"More evidence that when the big stage is there, I can bring my game and still compete with the best players in the world," Rose said.

"If you know that in your head, that gives you the motivation to then still work hard."

Rose knows he can summon his best when it matters most.

"When I've been playing well, I feel like I have been competing at a high level," Rose said. "My consistency maybe has not been as high this year, but my good is good again so I'm excited about that."

O.Farraj--SF-PST