Glover's eagle from 138 yards away at the par-4 shot him up the leaderboard to seven-under after he had a string of five straight birdies at holes 5-9.

The former U.S Open champion added consecutive birdies at 15 and 16 to take the lead over Ryan Armour and Ryan Moore (eight-under) at Keen Trace Golf Club.

"That's one of those hole locations where you've got a chance to get it really close because you've got a backstop behind it and just kind of got to get it online and it's going to feed to it," Glover said of the eagle. "And I did that and it just happened to go in."

Glover, 43, has four career wins on the PGA Tour. He went 10 years between his last two wins (2011 and 2021).

The Barbasol is staged as an alternate event opposite the Genesis Scottish Open, where most of the best players in the world are tuning up for next week's Open Championship.

Behind Armour and Moore, four players are tied for fourth after shooting a seven-under 65 – Wesley Bryan, Cody Gribble, Andrew Novak and England's Daniel Brown.

Gribble had two eagles in his round, beginning on the back nine at the par-5 15th and again toward the end of his round at the par-5 8th. The former was a 44-foot putt, and the latter was a simpler 11-footer.

Greg Chalmers and Cameron Percy are the highest placed Australians at two-under, while Jason Scrivener is a shot further adrift.