Rory has one course left to MASTER
Augusta, though not all of its history is pleasant, would be a fitting place for McIlroy to complete his grand slam
AUGUSTA should not foster legends. It is a place with a rancid history in the matter of race.
Lee Elder became the first black man to play the tournament, in 1975. His build-up to the Masters was less concerned with Amen Corner than ensuring he stayed safe there; he had to deal with threats warning him to stay away from Georgia.
‘That was part of the reason for renting two houses during the Masters week,’ he recalled. ‘The logic behind that was the fact we did not want the people to know where I was staying.’
While there was no explicit proscription on black players before Elder, they had never been invited even when, as Charlie Sifford had in 1967 and 1969, they fulfilled the necessary qualifying criteria.
Black players endured years of racist abuse in the southern American states in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, but the issue with Augusta was one of exclusion and the unspoken reasons for it.
Augusta is also a place that has been restrained by antediluvian views on gender: former US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice was one of the first two women admitted by the club as members – and that was just five years ago, in 2012.
The place revels in its exclusivity. Its membership is put at about 300 (these details are never revealed) and is extended by invite-only. When Bill Gates tried to discreetly lobby for an invitation to join, he saw his ambitions set back over a decade.
Yet this coming week is wonderful, with one of the most authentic sporting spectacles guaranteed. Behind the antebellum Southern manners, the exclusivity and the pungency of parts of its history, Augusta National offers drama, heartache, intrigue, controversy and some of the finest instances of sporting excellence one could hope to see.
Pitching some of the best sportsmen in the world into battle makes excitement inevitable, but the action at the Masters is heightened by the setting. A colleague once described it as Narnia, and the beauty can seem otherworldly.
When Rory McIlroy was foostering around after his tee shot at the tenth ricocheted off a tree towards a nearby cabin in 2011, the scene depended for its effect not just on the disintegration of his Masters’ ambitions, but on the fact that turmoil was breaking loose amid a setting of quiet, pastoral beauty.
When Jordan Spieth plopped two balls into Rae’s Creek on his way to his own torment at the 12th last year, the splendour of Amen Corner, its stark perfection, framed the contrast with the bedlam tearing his game apart.
Regular excellence is central to the drama, too. Watching a player committed to perfection find his rhythm and eventually his calm completely desert him has accounted for the unforgettable miseries suffered by Greg Norman, McIlroy and Spieth.
BUT their agonies were not self-contained; Nick Faldo’s unerring play unsettled Norman and eventually carried the day. Danny Willett picked his way around the ruins of Spieth’s ambitions to win an unlikely green jacket 12 months ago.
The quality of play underpins everything else. As it is the first major of the year, and the most COUNTDOWN TO THE MASTERS 4 DAYS TO GO prestigious, a field thick with quality is always in place. This year, Dustin Johnson is the name most often circled as a potential winner. He deserves to be: three consecutive PGA tour wins equal sensational form.
Importantly, too, he broke through the major mark in winning the US Open last year; that pressure gone, he has played like a man unencumbered by any concerns since. The prodigious Spaniard Jon Rahm has the talent and form to contend as well. A year ago, McIlroy, Spieth
and Jason Day were figured to be the three main contestants. All have had troubles in 2017. McIlroy recovered from a fractured rib earlier this year to play solidly, Spieth started this season brilliantly before tailing off somewhat, and Day is not even sure if he will tee up on Thursday as he deals with the serious health problems his mother is enduring.
ATTENTION in this country will concentrate on McIlroy, even in this least partisan of sports, where players attract fans through their style more than their national affiliation (as proven by McIlroy’s ongoing popularity despite the dramas surrounding his sense of identity).
Paul McGinley warned yesterday that the line of reasoning suggesting it is only a matter of when McIlroy wins at Augusta is dangerous. It has been exposed as foolish as the player has failed to contend in a significant way since leading after 63 holes in 2011.
Augusta is his number one priority this season. Sources close to him attested to that months ago; his preparation has been bent towards these coming days since the end of last season.
Putting has been his consistent weakness, and nowhere is a failinge more cruelly exposed than around Augusta. The greens are shaved free of kindness and mercy, and McIlroy has floundered as a result.
This aspect of his game improved enormously in the second part of last year thanks to his work with the English putting specialist Phil Kenyon. Victories in the Deutsche Bank Championship and the FedEx Cup duly followed.
Augusta is celebrated as a course befitting big hitters like McIlroy – it is one of the reasons given by fanciers of Johnson – but the Green Jacket is decided by the efficiency of players’ short games. Even as he battled for consistency a year ago, Spieth still led up to the 12th thanks to his accuracy in this regard. Were McIlroy to maintain the standard introduced since he started working with Kenyon, he has a tremendous chance, perhaps his best since 2011. Pressure will not be a problem for him; he doesn’t know what it feels like to pick up a golf club without the accompaniment of expectation. It has been his life since he was a toddler. Putting has been his weakness. If it stays corrected until Sunday night, he will pass into legend, at a place that has made plenty of them.