Tiger Woods, the defending champion and 7-4 favourite to win a fourth US Open championship before it rained on his parade on Thursday, avoided an ignominious exit after two rounds at Bethpage Black, the public golf course on which he was the only player to finish under par when he won his second national championship in 2002. Former American amateur champion Ricky Barnes held the lead after adding a second-round 65 to his opening 67 for an eight-under-par total, 11 strokes better than Woods, who fired 69 after a shocking finish in his first-round 74.

A double bogey on the 15th and two more bogeys on the 16th and 18th pushed the world No 1 towards unfamiliar territory. He has missed the cut only once as a pro in the US Open and that was in 2006, when he shot successive rounds of 76 just six weeks after the death of his father, Earl. He began his second round on the 10th hole by pushing his drive towards a fairway bunker. His ball got caught up in the first cut of rough and from there he managed to play a good recovery shot to the back of the green and two-putt for par. He missed a birdie putt on the 11th and pulled a mid-iron into a greenside bunker on the 12th — one of three par-four holes measuring more than 500 yards — which necessitated a solid up-and-down to remain at four over before he made his first birdie on the par-five 13th.

When he fluffed a pitch from rough beside the 15th green, it led to a bogey but back-to-back birdies on the 18th and the first hole lifted him from four over to two over. Woods bogeyed the third but came back with another birdie on the par-five fourth before a bogey on the ninth rubbed salt in his wounds. “My score doesn’t reflect how I’ve been playing,” he argued. “But it is what it is. There are still another 36 holes to play and I have to keep plugging away. I’m hitting the ball well enough — I just need to make a few more putts.”

Woods won his third US Open 12 months ago at Torrey Pines with a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his left leg and it might take another miracle to win from this position.

Barnes, who does not have a top-10 finish in 12 PGA tour starts this year, was considered to be the next big thing when he beat Hunter Mahan 2 & 1 to win the United States Amateur Championship in 2002 at Oakland Hills. Of 10 tournaments he entered in 2003, he made no cuts and he has made no impact on the PGA tour or Nationwide tour. In four previous appearances at the US Open he missed the cut three times and tied for 59th but here he has played impressively, reaching 16 of 18 greens in regulation in his first round and 15 in his second. In 36 holes on soft greens, which have become increasingly bumpy with all the rain and traffic, he has not three-putted once. A single bogey on the 10th hole in his first round testified to his consistency.

Lee Westwood’s fighting 66 showed his resolve and he lies only six shots behind, alongside fellow Englishman Ross Fisher, who shot 68. No European has won the US Open since Tony Jacklin prevailed at Hazeltine in 1970 but Westwood believes he can challenge. The 36-year-old from Worksop trailed Woods by one going into the final round at Torrey Pines but played his way into the lead with nine holes remaining and missed a 20-foot birdie putt on the 72nd hole for a place in the playoff with Woods and Rocco Mediate.

He began his round yesterday with three birdies and, although he slipped up on the 15th and 17th, he came back strongly to birdie the fourth, fifth and eighth holes. “I wanted to start well and it gave me confidence that I was able to do just that,” Westwood said. “I learnt a lot from playing with Tiger in the final group last year. I felt comfortable when I got into the lead and even though I almost played my way out of it I had a real chance over the last few holes. It wasn’t that Tiger played out of this world to beat me. He just made fewer errors and perhaps I was trying too hard. But the way I was able to hang in there makes me incredibly optimistic that I can win a major championship.”

Fisher, beaten by Paul Casey by one shot at the BMW PGA Championship last month at Wentworth, fired a 68. “I came here with the firm belief that I can win the tournament and I feel ready to win a major,” he declared.

Lucas Glover, whose grandfather played American football as a professional while his father was a professional baseball player, is one of the PGA tour’s longer hitters and he opened with a 69 on Friday, enjoyed a quick lunch and made five birdies through 13 holes of his second round while stretching his streak to 19 holes without a bogey before darkness came and play was suspended. He resumed his round on six under par, picked up another birdie on the 15th hole and finished on seven under, one ahead of Mike Weir, the Canadian who won The Masters in 2003. Much has been made of the perception that only players who drive the ball long distances could prosper on a course measuring 7,426 yards. Weir, who is not a big hitter, proved otherwise with his first-round 64, which even included a double bogey, followed by a solid 70.

World No 3 Paul Casey struggled with the conditions, missing the cut after successive rounds of 75, as did Open and USPGA champion Padraig Harrington who shot back-to-back 76s. Phil Mickelson managed to put aside the anguish of his wife’s battle with breast cancer to shoot 70 and remain one under.