Killarney has Rory’s vote as he gets back into swing
It is now the consensus opinion that the 22-year-old from Holywood needed to lose the Masters in April in order to triumph 10 weeks later at Congressional Country Club and having flapped in the wind at Royal St George’s two weekends ago as fellow Irishman Darren Clarke won the British Open, McIlroy is busy putting his game back together for a three-week run on his preferred parkland courses.
That stretch starts today at the Irish Open presented by Discover Ireland 2011 and will continue via the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational to the final Major of the year, the PGA Championship in Atlanta.
Aside from rumours of a budding romance with Danish tennis star Caroline Wozniacki, McIlroy said yesterday in Killarney, ahead of playing the pro-am with Enda Kenny, that he had been working hard since the British Open on unwrinkling his wind-buffeted swing with coach Michael Bannon.
“I actually hit balls with Michael on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday last week. So we just spent a couple of hours with him every day. But we were actually quite surprised. The swing was in a good shape and I’m hitting it well.”
McIlroy also revealed he had spent five days on holiday but declined to go into details other than to say: “I just relaxed, chilled out. I got out of the bad weather at home and went away and had a few days of sun.”
After the weekend McIlroy had in Sandwich — shooting 74 and 73 to slip to a tie for 25th — avoiding the wind and rain at home is perfectlyunderstandable, although he moved to scale back his comments made on the Sunday afternoon when he bemoaned the conditions and said he would not adapt his game in order to win in them.
“I was very frustrated coming off the golf course on the Sunday,” he said. “If I had a little more time to think about it; yeah, I probably would have said something different. I was honest and said what I felt at the time. I just said that these conditions this week just didn’t suit me and my game. So it was tough. I’m going to have to learn how to play in those conditions going forward.
“When it’s blowing 30 miles an hour, you don’t really want to go out and hit that many balls. It’s going to happen in the future where you’re going to have conditions like that. You just have to deal with them as best you can. I feel if I did get an Open championship where the weather was quite benign, I’d have a lot better chance of contending.”
McIlroy certainly has a chance of contending at Killarney Golf & Fishing Club, where he finished tied for 35th, 16 shots back of champion Ross Fisher. That was then though, and this week certainly has a different feel to it with both he and Clarke arriving in Kerry with Major trophies and both chasing a unique double.
“It would be nice to win the two in the same year but it will be tough,” McIlroy said. “I think the scoring will be pretty good. It was pretty good last year. I remember Ross Fisher shot 61 in one of the rounds, so you’re going to have to shoot the lights out to have a chance to win.”
Whether he does or not, McIlroy recognised the excitement that had been generated by his and Clarke’s success. “I don’t think I’ve ever been this excited about an Irish Open,” he said. “With Darren doing what he did a couple of weeks ago, and myself winning in the US, I think there’s a tremendous atmosphere and a great buzz about the tournament.
“I’m really looking forward to it. I feel like I haven’t played that much golf since playing the Open, and so it will be nice to get back into some competitive action and get ready for the next three weeks.
“I think everybody is excited the tournament is back in Killarney this year. (The fans) always come out in force, and they support the event very well. It should make for a great week.”
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