McIlroy aims high and long for a title tilt
INSPIRED by Novak Djokovic’s triumph at Wimbledon, Rory McIlroy is ready to throw caution to the wind this week in an effort to win The Open and end his near four-year drought at the majors.
On the course where he won the silver medal as leading amateur in 2007, the 29-year-old is planning an aggressive strategy off the tee that will see him attempt to drive several of Carnoustie’s par fours measuring over 400 yards, that have been brought within reach due to the parched fairways.
‘We’re seeing a Carnoustie we haven’t played before, where you can take clubs you would never dream of hitting under normal conditions,’ he said.
McIlroy was out on the course at 7am yesterday alongside the Spaniard Jon Rahm, and the two sluggers had a ball. To heck with convention and threading long irons between bunkers. If you’ve got the guts and the skill, why not channel your inner Seve and take the sand traps out of play? It never did the most charismatic European golfer of all time any harm on his way to winning three Claret Jugs, did it?
‘We’re supposed to see the same wind direction for the rest of the week and if you’re someone like us who can fly it over 300 yards, you can basically take all the trouble out of play on a lot of the holes,’ reasoned McIlroy. ‘Obviously you have to pick your points, but I think you’ll see the big hitters play aggressively. Get it down there with a wedge in your hand, with there not being a lot of rough, and you’ve got a big advantage.’
It’s a sign of how confident McIlroy is with a driver right now that there might only be three or four holes where he doesn’t deploy his favourite weapon. ‘Even the first hole, I’ve never thought of hitting a driver there before but if you hit it down the left, you can get it on the green,’ he said, of a hole measuring 398 yards. ‘The third is usually an iron off the tree all day long but even that hole, if they’re using a back pin position and it’s downwind, you can fly it on to the green [Jockie’s Burn runs in front of the green approximately 320 yards from the tee]. I’m so excited about the week. I think you’re going to see so many different strategies.’
How good to hear McIlroy so bubbly. Sure, it might all end in tears with drives flying out of bounds, into burns, or cavernous bunkers. But he’s the natural heir to Seve Ballesteros, not Nick Faldo — a risk-taker, not a strategist.
‘I think as you get older you get more conservative but playing with Jon was a useful reminder to me of how I used to play,’ he said.
Part of McIlroy’s enthusiasm stems from watching Djokovic, who ended a three-year drought of his own at Wimbledon on Sunday.
‘I think golfers and tennis players can usually relate to one another because for both of us it’s about four tournaments,’ said Rory. ‘Watching Novak win Wimbledon, he hadn’t won it for a while, and the emotion he showed was really cool. It reinforces what a huge deal it is to win a major, and when you’ve won a couple, you want to win more.’
It is often held that The Open doesn’t play to McIlroy’s strengths but in his last three appearances he’s finished first, tied fourth and tied fifth, so it hardly equates to his performances at the US Open, where he has missed three cuts in a row.
Four years is long enough, isn’t it Rory? A sheepish expression spread across his face. ‘I guess four years is nothing in terms of a career but when you look at the rate I was winning them, it does feel a long time,’ he said.