Race to Dubai: McIlroy and Chacarra set for Sunday showdown at season-ending World Tour Championship

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Rory McIlroy had a day to forget at the season-ending World Tour Championship on Saturday, ending four shots off the lead and seeing Race to Dubai rival Eugenio Chacarra haul himself back into contention.

Tyrrell Hatton held the lead at the end of the third round after shooting 4-under 68 to move to 9 under overall, one stroke ahead of Victor Perez (67).

As well as attempting to win the World Tour Championship for a fourth time (after 2012, ’15 and ’24), McIlroy is seeking to move past Chacarra in the points list to secure the year-long Race to Dubai title, which crowns the No. 1 player on the European tour.

World No. 2 McIlroy started the day with a share of the 36-hole lead with Hatton. The Northern Irishman had an eagle on the par-5 No. 7 before four bogeys in an even par 72, dropping to 5 under overall and a four-way tie for fourth place, including current Race to Dubai leader Chacarra (68).

Chacarra — a 26-year-old Spaniard in his first full season on the tour — leads McIlroy in the Race to Dubai standings by nearly 534 points. On offer this week is 2,000 points for the winner, 1,335 for second place, 752 for third place, then fewer and fewer for the minor places.

“I want to show the world I’m capable to play under pressure, and I think so far I’ve been doing that,” Chacarra said. “I think all of my goals have been done this season. So I’m just playing free. This is an extra bonus to have a chance to win it, and just to enjoy every moment.”

McIlroy is chasing a record-tying eighth Race to Dubai title for his career alongside Colin Montgomerie, who won the award when it was called the “Order of Merit.”

Patrick Reed, third in the Race to Dubai standings, shot a 5-under 67. That left the American tied for 33rd at 3 over after struggling over the first two days.

See AP’s full golf coverage here

Eugenio Chacarra of Spain plays his second shot on the 16th hole during the third round of the World Tour Golf Championship at Jumeirah Golf Estates in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Saturday, Nov. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Altaf Qadri)

Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland plays his second shot on the 16th hole during the third round of the World Tour Golf Championship at Jumeirah Golf Estates in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Saturday, Nov. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Altaf Qadri)

Tyrrell Hatton of England, left, and Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland line up putts on the ninth green during the third round of the World Tour Golf Championship at Jumeirah Golf Estates in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Saturday, Nov. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Altaf Qadri)

Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland reacts on the fifth green during the third round of the World Tour Golf Championship at Jumeirah Golf Estates in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Saturday, Nov. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Altaf Qadri)

Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland looks on from the 16th fairway during the third round of the World Tour Golf Championship at Jumeirah Golf Estates in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Saturday, Nov. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Altaf Qadri)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Airlines across the U.S. worked to recover from the longest nationwide ground stop in 25 years that canceled thousands of flights Saturday, stranded hundreds of thousands of passengers, spread ripple effects around the world, and forced pro and college sports teams to scramble for alternate transportation.

New technology being added to the nation’s air traffic control system overloaded antiquated equipment and caused “intermittent” communications and radar gaps, leading to the flight shutdown of more than four hours, Trump administration officials said.

Planes were taking flight and landing Saturday, Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy said/ But the effects could be felt for days. Officials say the system will likely return to normal in time to handle the Thanksgiving travel rush.

The nationwide stop was the first since January 2023, when another key Federal Aviation Administration computer system that sends notices to pilots malfunctioned, and the second since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

Andrew Charlton, an aviation consultant, said Friday's stoppage affected about a quarter of the 45,000 flights in the U.S. each day.

“The knock-on effect of that is incredible,” said Charlton, managing director of Aviation Advocacy. “The aircraft doesn’t just fly from A to B and back to B and then stop. It then moves onto C and then over to E and around and around and around. It is, of course, exacerbated if you’re talking about long-haul flights, international flights over the Atlantic or over the Pacific.”

At airports, passengers stared at screens showing delays or rushed to find buses or trains to their destinations.

Emily Brown and her 14-year-old daughter waited more than four hours Friday at the Dallas airport for their flight to Columbus, Ohio, before giving up. They were traveling to surprise her daughter’s best friend. Instead, she had to settle for phoning the friend through tears in the airport, Brown said.

“She saved up her money to buy her own ticket, and she’s planned this whole weekend,” Brown said. “Now we’re not sure when we’re gonna be able to go.”

A cheerful Southwest Airlines gate agent greeted passengers at Dallas Love Field at dawn Saturday with, “Good morning, good morning,” then repeatedly said all flights were full and asked passengers to have boarding passes ready to expedite the process and help keep flights moving.

Sports teams scheduled to play this weekend adjusted game start times, searched for hotel rooms, rescheduled flights and chartered buses. No. 19 Mississippi’s game at Oklahoma was delayed a full day to Sunday. Start times for some other games were pushed back hours.

FlightAware, a website that tracks flights, said more than 4,100 flights had been canceled. Cirium, a similar site, put that number above 3,200 flights.

Corbyn Wascher's flight was on the tarmac at the Charlotte, N.C., airport for four hours Friday on his way home to Moline, Illinois, from a conference in Miami. The 37-year-old high school teacher paid $100 to take an Uber to a hotel 25 minutes from the airport after he was unable to find a flight until Saturday afternoon to Chicago.

At London’s Heathrow Airport, several flights to and from the U.S. were listed as delayed or canceled Saturday.

“While U.S. flights have resumed, there may be some follow-on disruption as airlines work to rebook affected passengers and get all services back to normal,” said Tim Johnson, consumer director at the U.K. Civil Aviation Authority.

Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin told reporters at the White House that no one was in any danger as more than 3,000 flights in the air at the time of the grounding order landed safely.

Duffy blamed Congress for failing to approve more funding for new technology, while downplaying the fact that trying to implement new fixes overtaxed the system. He suggested more disruptions might occur.

“We didn’t think we would have this kind of outage. We did,” he said. “We were able to review what went wrong, and then reboot the system and go. But, you will have more of these.”

Duffy said the failure involved old equipment and was not linked to the FAA’s new AI-powered system, which the agency is rolling out to help predict problems in the sky.

The problem was due to updating a system that can never shut down, Charlton said.

“What you’re watching here is trying to change the tires of your car when the car’s going at 80 miles an hour down the expressway, because nothing stops in aviation,” Charlton said. “It’s a 24/7 operation. And to make changes on the fly, if you’ll pardon that pun, is incredibly complex and dangerous.”

The FAA already replaced thousands of old copper wires with fiber optic lines and upgraded hundreds of radio systems as part of the overhaul that began last year after Congress approved $12.5 billion in funding. Duffy and the White House are pushing for $30 billion more to complete the work.

The problem appeared similar to a regional air traffic control communication outage in September that snarled hundreds of flights across the Northeast, although that disruption was linked to a construction crew cutting a fiber optic line. Aging equipment was also blamed for brief radar outages last year that disrupted Newark airport.

Aviation safety expert Steve Arroyo said the difference this time was the nationwide scale of the disruption, which left controllers unable to reliably talk to pilots.

“If you don’t have that ability, whether it’s because the old wires that they have are just run down or for whatever reason, you’ve got to stop airplanes on the ground and not put them in the air, where you’re going to risk not being able to communicate with them,” said Arroyo, a former United Airlines pilot.

It differed from the one after 9/11 because planes were not being told to land immediately and pilots likely were able to communicate with ground controllers at airports, Arroyo said.

Funk reported from Omaha, Nebraska, and Golden from Seattle. Associated Press journalists David Keyton in Berlin; Stephen Hawkins in Dallas; Mead Gruver in Fort Collins, Colorado; Jessica Hill in Las Vegas; Ali Swenson in Chicago; Alex Veiga and Jaimie Ding in Los Angeles; Seung Min Kim and Aamer Madhani in Washington; Hannah Schoenbaum in Salt Lake City; and Brian Melley in London contributed to this report.

Passenger watch as workers unload luggage from a United plane as flights are delayed at Los Angeles International Airport Friday, Nov. 13, 2026, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Ethan Swope)

Passengers wait as flights are delayed inside a terminal at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on Friday, Nov. 13, 2026, in Seattle. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)

The sun sets over Dallas Fort Worth International Airport in DFW Airport, Texas, Friday, Nov. 13, 2026, after the Federal Aviation Administration grounded flights nationwide. (AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez)

A passenger moves through Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International airport as all flights are canceled or delayed, Friday, Nov. 13, 2026, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)

People wait at a terminal at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, Friday, Nov. 13, 2026, in Arlington, Va., after the FAA issued a nationwide ground stop. (AP Photo/Tom Brenner)

An agent helps travelers at a ticketing desk at LaGuardia Airport in New York, Friday, Nov. 13, 2026, after the Federal Aviation Administration grounded flights nationwide. (AP Photo/Ryan Murphy)