Mcilroy aims to roll back the years to ‘carefree’ attitude
Ulsterman hopes to revive 2007 approach ‘The more I can be like that kid, the better’
In his quest to end a four-year drought without a major title, Rory Mcilroy is drawing inspiration from the devil-may-care spirit of his teenage years. On the eve of the 147th Open, he argued that the memory of his youthful audacity here in 2007, when he won the Silver Medal as an 18-year-old amateur, could propel him towards lifting the Claret Jug for a second time. “I look back at those pictures,” he said, “and the more I can be like that kid, the better.”
Revisiting the images of his exploits here 11 years ago is like stepping through a portal to an alternate universe. These days, Mcilroy is a dedicated gym rat, sculpting a physique befitting his status as a globally-recognised athlete. But in that glorious summer of ’07, he looked more like a scamp among the superstars, his frame upholstered by rolls of puppy fat and his cherubic face framed by a wild Dennis the Menace haircut. Appearances, it turned out, could be deceptive: the Ulsterman made good at that Open on all his precocious promise, outscoring his idol Tiger Woods in the first round and sealing the prize for best amateur by a street.
No wonder, then, that the recollections triggered a rush of nostalgia yesterday. Mcilroy, at 29, is at a strange crossroads in his gilded career. When he secured his third major at Hoylake in 2014, and then a fourth at the USPGA three weeks later, he seemed predestined to join the immortals. But since that momentous evening at Valhalla, 14 majors have come and gone without his name on the trophy, prompting a question to him here about whether he needed a fifth title to cement his legacy.
Mcilroy acknowledged that when he first tore through the Carnoustie field, he could not have imagined the “journey that I was about to embark on”. Then, he was just an insouciant lad from Holywood, his only claim to wider fame being the clip of him chipping golf balls into a washing machine on Irish television. Today, he has the wealth of Croesus and a Palm Beach mansion larger than some Scottish castles. And yet it was by looking to the past, Mcilroy explained, that he could learn to throw off the pressures that stalk him every time he tees it up on this stage.
“I need to get back to that attitude where I play carefree, just happy to be here,” he said. “I feel like a golf tournament is where I am most comfortable. But the pressure starts to weigh on you a little bit. As you get older, you become more cautious in life. There is something nice about being young and oblivious to some stuff. When we last played the Open here, I was bouncing down the fairways, didn’t care if I shot 82 or 62. The more I can get into that mindset, the better I’ll play golf.”
While Mcilroy is much the best judge of his own game, this statement is a moot point. With the ground at Carnoustie this week about as yielding as the surface of the M25, it does not appear the perfect place to try “hero golf ”, thrashing the driver on every hole with no regard for risk.
For all that Mcilroy might be able to launch his tee-shots over 400 yards with a following breeze, some punishing rough awaits the unwary, not to mention pot bunkers galore. This is one setting where discretion is the better part of valour.
It is not as if Mcilroy has stalled. He won the Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill just four months ago and began his Masters Sunday in the final pairing, only to be subdued by a bullish Patrick Reed. But he recognises that he needs his customary swagger to return if he is to reignite the form of old, where he waltzed to his maiden major triumph at the 2011 US Open by an extraordinary eight shots. To that end, playing practice rounds at Carnoustie alongside Jon Rahm, the huge-hitting Spaniard with no conception of risk, has helped.
“He doesn’t think about the trouble,” Mcilroy said. “He just thinks, ‘This is where I want to hit it, and this is where I want it to go.’ For Mcilroy, the burden of expectation is most cumbersome at Augusta, where he continues to chase the Green Jacket that would complete a career Grand Slam. But he hardly wants for motivation at this Open Championship, either.
Should he prevail come Sunday, he stands to take the Claret Jug back to Royal Portrush in his native Northern Ireland, the venue for next summer’s tournament and the place where he shot a course-record 61 at the age of 16. According to Mcilroy, links golf remains his favourite form of the sport, and yet his relationship with the Open has proved a chequered one.
In 2011, he lamented the tempestuous weather that battered Royal St George’s, shrugging: “It’s not my sort of golf.” Two years later at Muirfield, while beset by battles with his former management company, he shot an opening 79 and admitted subsequently that he felt “brain-dead”.
This time, he is free of both distractions and excuses. “I feel I’ve developed and grown as a links player,” he said. “I hope I can get closer to being right in the mix on Sunday.” There could, one senses, be a revival of a few teenage kicks along the way.
Oliver Brown’s prediction Jon Rahm The powerful Spaniard is in stellar form. At 23, he would also fit the recent trend where major champions are growing younger.