The 40-year-old Dane followed up an opening-round 68 with a 3-under 69 in chilly, overcast conditions at the PGA Centenary course in Gleneagles which will host the 2014 Ryder Cup, joining Italy’s Lorenzo Gagli and England’s Kenneth Ferrie on 7 under.

After rolling back the years to finish fourth at Royal St. George’s six weeks ago, the 70th-ranked Bjorn struggled in the US by tying a lowly 68th at the Bridgestone Invitational and then missing the cut at the US PGA Championship.

Returning to European soil, he is back in his element, impressing in the rain and cold in central Scotland as he bids for a second victory of 2011 following his win at the Qatar Masters in February.

“I played extremely well that week at the Open and got a lot of confidence. But I found myself in a position I always do where I then go to America and all of a sudden have to hit the ball straight up in the air. I found it impossible,” said Bjorn, an 11-time winner on the European Tour.

“My confidence took a knock in America and I didn’t feel comfortable at all with my golf. I went home and worked for a few days, came here and found a few things I need to do to control the ball again. I’m playing decent golf.”

Bjorn dropped just one shot on Friday, on No. 15 (his sixth hole of the day), but three birdies around the turn propelled him up the leaderboard. He then picked up a fourth shot at the long par-4 No. 7.

Ferrie mirrored Bjorn’s scoring to move into contention for a first win since 2005, and Gagli — a graduate from the second-tier Challenge Tour — shot 68 to continue a strong recent run that saw him finish third in the Scottish Open, eighth in the Irish Open and fifth in the Czech Open last week.

Spain’s Pablo Larrazabal (68) and England’s James Morrison (69) are in the clubhouse a shot adrift, while Anthony Kang of the US shot a 66 — the joint lowest of the week with overnight leader Mark Foster — to move to 5 under alongside former winner Marc Warren of Scotland (69), France’s Raphael Jacquelin (70), England’s Oliver Wilson (69) and Sweden’s Magnus Carlsson (72).
 

In Edison, New Jersey, Matt Kuchar returned to beautiful sunshine and a birdie to take the lead at The Barclays early Friday.

Kuchar, who won the opening FedEx Cup playoff event last year on a different course, was among 51 players who did not finish the rain-delayed first round. He drove into a greenside bunker on the reachable par-4 18th, blasted out to 3 feet and rapped in his birdie putt for an 8-under 63.

That gave him a one-shot lead over Harrison Frazar and William McGirt, who also had to finish his round in the morning.

McGirt had made seven birdies in an eight-hole span when play was halted by darkness on Thursday. The birdies disappeared when he got back to Plainfield, and he bogeyed the 17th before hitting just short of the green on 18 for an easy birdie. Frazar shot his 64 on Thursday.

Players had only a half-hour before they headed back out to start the second round.

And hurricane Irene is forcing the PGA Tour’s first playoff event to be reduced to 54 holes.

Slugger White, the tour’s vice president of competition, says up to 10 inches of rain is expected Sunday. That would make it impossible to get in 72 holes at The Barclays. The plan is to play the third round early Saturday and finish before the rain arrives.

It would be the first 54-hole tournament since the FedEx Cup playoffs began.

White says if the third round cannot be finished Saturday, the tournament would revert to 36 holes to determine which 100 players advance to the second playoff event next week in Boston. He was not sure if a 36-hole tournament — should that be the case — would be counted as an official win.