OPEN FOR BUSINESS!
Royal Birkdale braced for epic battle as golf’s big guns go in search of the Claret Jug
JASON DAY knows his golf game has suffered of late. He didn’t need yesterday’s surprise presentation of the Mark H McCormack Award — recognition for topping the world rankings in 2016 — to remind him that 2017 hasn’t quite lived up to heightened expectations.
All things considered, though, his toils and troubles on the course have been totally understandable.
They are nothing compared to the genuine life-and-death crisis that faced the Day family earlier this year.
Day’s mother, Dening, is now doing her best to defy the ‘terminal’ diagnosis with lung cancer she received six months ago. Given just a year to live, she has since undergone surgery described as ‘successful’.
Explaining why his work rate and discipline — essential to everything he achieved in a period starting with his USPGA win at the tail end of the 2015 season — had fallen off over the past six months, the Australian conceded he had stopped turning up for a spell.
‘I had the scare with my mum at the start of the year,’ he explained. ‘When you feel like you’re going to lose someone that is very close to you, there’s nothing you want to do more than just be with them.
‘You don’t want to think about playing golf or even think about working.
‘So there’s a stretch there where I’d just go home and just sit around with her.
‘And, obviously, the time I would be spending working and practicing, it caught up with me and I hadn’t been playing as great golf as I should have been. ‘I needed to take that time off because I thought I was losing my mum, and didn’t think she was going to be around any more. So I wanted to spend all the time with her I could. ‘Up to that time I’d only see her once every year. And that’s nowhere near enough time to spend with your mum.’ Day, still ranked sixth in the world, arrived late at Birkdale — thanks to Donald Trump’s travel plans sending JFK Airport into chaos — on the back of missed cuts at the US Open and Travelers Championship. Invited yesterday to sum up 2017, on and off the course, in a couple of words, the 29-year-old laughed as he said: ‘Oh, man, it wouldn’t be words that I could say here.
‘I’m happy and disappointed at the same time. I’m very happy about the results of my mum. I’m disappointed in my game.
‘You need really good balance in this game to play, like really in any sport. You need balance off the course and on the course, to be able to do the right things, think properly, be disciplined enough, be able to just play against the best players in the world.
‘It’s really difficult to play against these guys. And, when things are out of order and you’re trying to battle other things, and then you try to get to a golf course and play against the best players in the world, it makes it very, very difficult to win.
‘So I’m happy now, but a little disappointed in how things have progressed to here. But I have to understand sometimes that I’ve got to give myself a bit of leeway. Because I honestly believe good and big things are coming for me. I’ve got to just trust it and understand, keep working hard.
‘I’m able to focus on just really getting after it and working hard and trying to really pinpoint what has been going wrong in my game. Hopefully I’ll get back to winning form and get back to No 1. That would be the ultimate goal.’ During the impromptu presentation of the McCormack award yesterday, Day laughed when it was pointed out that one Tiger Woods had won the damned thing 14 times.
On the plus side, he’s arrived here with a putting tip straight from the 14-time Major winner himself. And Day revealed that Woods — not without his own troubles to seek of late — had been happy to help.
‘Its great to have a set of eyes like Tiger’s, one of the best clutch putters of all time, to be able to kind of see on TV what you’re doing wrong,’ Day said.
‘I had a chat with him and he seems like everything is doing okay with him.’
Although he’s re-dedicated himself to the game of late, Day wasn’t too disappointed to be held up Stateside for an extra day — even if it did cut into his practice time at Birkdale.
‘I was actually supposed to get here Sunday,’ he revealed: ‘But I was flying through JFK — and President Trump was there, so there was a bunch of delays. So I just decided to move my flight back a little bit later.
‘President Obama held me up one time flying out of Palm Springs. So I understand.
‘It meant I got to spend another day at home with the family, which was nice.’
I honestly believe that good things are coming. I just have to trust it