Hoey eager to keep Dubai hopes in Czech

MICHAEL HOEY returns to action at the Czech Open tomorrow determined to break into the European Tour’s Top 60, but realistic enough to know a bad bounce is all it takes to derail the best laid plans.

The Belfast golfer, who won his second career European Tour event at the Madeira Islands Open in May, tees it up in Celadna tomorrow after a break following the Irish Open, where he finished tied for 34th.

A strong finish in the Czech Republic this week will help to propel the 32-year-old further up the Race to Dubai rankings from 77th towards the top-60 spot that will earn him a place in the prestigious season-ending Dubai World Championships in December.

“I want to be top 60 end of the year, so I’ve got a bit to do,” Hoey told the Irish Examiner. “That was the goal I set myself after I won Madeira, but it’s difficult to have very specific goals because sometimes putts go in and sometimes they don’t.”

Such caution reflects a golfer who has not always mastered the art of patience in a fickle game that saw Hoey yo-yo between the Challenge Tour and its big brother the European Tour between 2002 and 2008 before breaking through with victory at Estoril Open de Portugal in 2009.

“I’ve got better with age,” he admitted. “You do need a phenomenal amount of patience. A tournament is a marathon and people just watching the highlights on Sky and don’t realise it’s five hours (per round) every day and there’s a lot of waiting around. So you need to be very optimistic when you hit a poor shot, definitely.

“I speak to (mind coach) Karl Morris as well, who’s helping me handle bad stuff that happens on the course, and my friend Mark Elliott is a sports psychologist at home who’s helped me a lot.”

Seeing fellow Irishmen win majors, particularly the Ulster contingent of the past two years — Graeme McDowell, Rory McIlroy and Darren Clarke — acts as an alternative inspiration to the drive for consistency, Hoey agreed.

“Yeah. I played Walker Cup with Graeme, I know his game well and I said to myself ‘you know, there wasn’t too much difference between us’. Some people go down different paths and, obviously, he’s gone down a different path and he’s won a major, was number five in the world and you think ‘he’s got to five in the world and I’ve played a lot of golf with him and could I do a bit better?”

Given the current success of Irish golf in producing four major winners, it is easy to overlook the success of the next tier of players who have also won on the European Tour, Hoey included. If the Shandon Park golfer feels ignored, though, he is not about to start moaning about a lack of recognition.

“The tournaments I’ve won have been great tournaments, but, until I win a big one, it’s obviously not going to get the same recognition.”