Pádraig Harrington’s stress advice for Shane Lowry
Lowry picked up a fine from the Tour and was warned to clean up his act after uttering an expletive which was picked up by microphones when he sent his ball into the water at the Florida tournament.
The WGC-Bridgestone Invitiational champion from Offaly accepted his punishment but insisted his passionate competitive spirit was part of his make-up, something Harrington empathised with.
Speaking in Dublin yesterday as he promoted Flora Pro Activ’s Cholesterol Awareness Campaign, the three-time major winner did suggest Lowry introduce less offensive language at times of stress or frustration.
“It certainly is his natural character. Shane is as Irish as could be and as normal as could be in that sense, and he doesn’t want to change that. That’s what’s made him the golfer that he is,” Harrington said. “He could say, ‘Feck’....’Feicidh’ is Irish for ‘I see’.
“Maybe that’s what he’ll have to do, find a different word. He’ll know what it means. I don’t see him hitting it in the water and going, ‘Golly gosh, gee whizz’, but he can find a different word that maybe for him will give him the same passion.
“At the end of the day four grand (the PGA Tour fine) goes to eight grand and it gets to a price where he says, ‘You know what, I’m not going to say that’.
“But he just does need to be true to himself and that’s what he’s really saying, is, ‘Hang on a second, this is what I am, if I start changing who I am...’
“What’s made him is comfort in who he is, but maybe substitute a different word for it and you know what, he can say it all he likes. ‘Feicidh a Mhic...’, that’s what my teacher used to say.
“ I’ve never thrown a club in my life. That’s my personality. The key here is, and Shane is 100 per cent right, he can’t change his personality and he doesn’t want to change his personality, he can substitute something in there so he can get the best of both worlds.”
He joked: “You know what, maybe he should run a competition on Twitter to find him a new word and everyone will know exactly what the word means.”
Harrington, 44, had been defending his Honda Classic title last weekend but finished in a tie for 43rd.
His season had begun with a tie for sixth at the Hyundai Tournament of Champions but he is still searching for the victory that will punch his ticket to next month’s Masters.
“The only way I can win the Masters is to win twice: I have to win one tournament to get in and then I have to win it.
“That’s the same with the Ryder Cup and the Olympics; I have to win first to put them on the horizon. Maybe that’s an issue, that all I’m thinking about is winning as in winning is the thing.
If you think too much about winning, everything is a disappointment. You think you have to hit the ball beautifully all the time and not make a mistake. If you’re not three-under after nine holes, how can you win the tournament?
“Sometimes that’s not the reality. At times I’m getting caught up in the result rather than if I just played away and added it all up, I’d be better off. It fascinates me in my 20th year (as a pro). It’s not like I wasn’t having to do this 20 years ago and remind myself. You have to do a huge amount of mental preparation.”
Less complicated was Harrington’s view of Rory McIlroy’s putting grip change, believing the switch to a left-hand low grip was being over-analysed.
“I played with Rory last week. I know he missed the cut, but as I said at the time, we’d all like to be playing like Rory, even when he misses the cut. He still looked pretty good to me. Changing the putting, his grip, guys do that. It’s not a big change. It’s kind of a superficial change. It’s not like he’s changing his stroke, A change of grip can very easily give him a little bit of a boost, and a little bit of ‘this feels good, this is working.’
“We all know that when he gets on a streak, he’s a match for anyone with his putting. It’s hard when you’re the individual doing it but when you look from the outside, you say you’d love to be doing what he’s doing.
“All he has to do is be patient and wait his turn. All of a sudden when he putts well, it brings confidence into his long game, and his long game is fantastic.
“In general, if you start putting well.. he has all the firepower in the long game. He just needs a good week on the greens. He’s going to have four or five good weeks on the greens, regardless, so that’s four or five wins.
“If he won a major a year, that would be incredible. All he has to do is putt well in one of the four Majors, and the best way of doing that is being patient with it.”
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