Shane Lowry left ruing average opening rounds after Saturday 66

Ireland’s Shane Lowry reacts to a missed putt on the 16th. Picture: ©INPHO/James Crombie

Golf at the Olympics feels different. For all sorts of reasons. Shane Lowry stands tied for 24th after a third round 66 at the Le Golf National on Saturday. If this was a normal week he would be chasing a top ten and some FedEx points. Not here.

Here, only three places matter.

Fifth on a normal PGA Tour week? Pretty damn good. Fifth here? Nowheresville.

“Yeah, look, the first couple of days, I played my way out of the tournament but yeah, it is a strange feeling because I said to the boys this morning, ‘right, lads, two 63s and finish fourth’. It's like, that's just sort of… 

“But you're still, as a pro golfer, you still have a lot of pride in what you do, and even I'm going out there this morning… I'm pretty much out of it, unless I shoot eight-, nine-under today. And I had a chance to do that at certain stages of the round. I had it going.

“Yeah, it is a lot different because you know on a different week if you just make the cut, if I can finish top ten, there's plenty of FedExCup points available and all else goes with it. Yeah, it is different. It is certainly different, yeah.” 

Two opening level-par rounds of 71 did too much damage to the Offaly man’s hopes of adding an Olympic medal to his collection and leaves Rory McIlroy as Ireland’s sole hope of making the podium in this event at the third time of asking.

“It's still good,” said Lowry who has spoken before about his pride at representing his country, and carrying the flag at the opening ceremony. “Crowds are good. I can't believe the amount of Irish support I've had out there. It's been incredible.

“I said to Darren [Reynolds, his caddie], not even doing well and they are still out there. It's pretty cool. I was in Tokyo, you were in Tokyo, as well, and let's be honest, it didn't feel like a huge tournament but Covid, COVID was weird.

“But this certainly feels like one of the biggest tournaments in the world when you're here, which is pretty cool.” Lowry compared the atmosphere to the Ryder Cup.

“I'd like to see Rory in there with a shout [on Sunday] because it would be interesting to see what the Irish guys would be like. It would almost be like a mini-Ryder Cup but no… You know what I mean, with all the different countries involved.

“Because there's going to be 20 people going out there with a chance to medal tomorrow. Yeah, it will be interesting to see how it is because obviously I wasn't in Rio. I was in Tokyo and then this is a whole other level.”