Rahm erases Johnson's advantage to share lead at Tour Championship

Jon Rahm shot a 65 in Round 1 of the Tour Championship to chase down Dustin Johnson and share the first-round lead at 13-under par.

Rahm's 5-under performance Friday erased the two-shot edge Johnson held going into the week. Johnson started at 10-under as the FedEx Cup points leader.

The co-leaders continued to exchange blows on the heels of last week's thrilling finish at the BMW Championship, which Rahm won in a playoff over Johnson. They made seven birdies combined on the difficult back nine at East Lake Golf Club, with six of those coming on only three holes.

"I feel like I was doing most of the pushing because I made pretty much every single birdie putt before (Johnson) did," Rahm said about the leaders' duel Friday. "Props to him to be making them on top of me."

Rahm added: "I kind of stole that tournament last week from him and he started with a two-shot lead, so, hopefully, I can steal this one as well."

Here's how the top of the leaderboard stands after Round 1:

Justin Thomas came into the week ranked third in the standings and started three shots back of Johnson. He managed to close the gap to two with a 4-under 66.

Rory McIlroy, who played his first round as a father, shot his career-best at East Lake with a 6-under 64. McIlroy is a two-time winner of the Tour Championship and is looking for his second straight FedEx Cup title win.

"Golf was the furthest thing from my mind the first few days this week," McIlroy said. "And then, once we got home on Wednesday and everything was good and mom and baby were healthy, that sort of took a load off my mind and that meant I could come here and somewhat focus on what I'm supposed to do."

McIlroy has yet to finish inside the top 10 since the PGA Tour's restart in June.

"I've seen signs of my game that's getting a little better over the last couple weeks," McIlroy continued. "I played OK last week in Chicago. It's nice when you come here, even though I've had success here, I was coming in with no expectations. I didn't touch a club for four days in between tournaments."

McIlroy's 64 tied Abraham Ancer for the lowest score of the day.

Round 2 from East Lake begins Saturday at 11:45 a.m. ET with the final pairing of Johnson and Rahm teeing off at 2:05 p.m.