Rónán MacNamara in Royal Troon
Shane Lowry had words of encouragement from Pádraig Harrington ringing in his ears on Sunday at the Open Championship and it made him realise how much he misses his compatriot on the main tour.
Harrington plays the majority of his golf on the Champions Tour these days and he was always good for a positive chat with Lowry on the PGA Tour and some chipping competitions with the Offaly man who is now ranked 105th in strokes gained around the green with those once magic hands lacking a spark.
Lowry carded a morale damaging 77 on day three of the Open in Royal Troon but a chance meeting with Harrington on Saturday night did help him to regather his mind even if he was trying not to listen!
“Padraig was trying to give his positive talk, and I was trying not to listen,” smiled Lowry after a final round of 68 saw him come up five shots shy of Xander Schauffele.
“I said to the boys, I said, that’s the reason I miss Paddy out on Tour. He’s not there full-time now. I miss him an awful lot just for his positivity and just how good of a person he is.
“But, yeah, he certainly was helpful last night. I wasn’t taking any help. I turned off my phone and just tried to be with the people around me and go out today and give it my best, and I did that. Unfortunately, it wasn’t good enough.”
Harrington narrowly missed out on a top-20 finish in Troon this week and he admitted that his chat with Lowry on Saturday wasn’t anything like a last resort rescue mission.
“We just had a chat. Wasn’t anything like that. He had his crew with him, and I sat down with him for a while, and we just talked about everything. I don’t think he needed me and I don’t think I had to be there, but you know me; prepared to give anybody a lecture.
“He was well in the tournament, as you can see today. He’s well in the tournament now. Even if he comes home and shoots — he has to have a big back nine from there, but 2-, 3-under par from there, as I said, somebody has to shoot under par coming home. Even those 5-unders, if they can come home in 1- or 2-under par, they’ll be the winner.
“But it’s unlikely they’ll get away with coming home in 1-over par.”
Harrington will head to the Senior Open in Carnoustie this week looking to roll back the years to 2007 when he claimed the first of his two Claret Jugs.
The three-time major winner was delighted with his ball striking but a cold putter saw him register just nine birdies, a figure he knows he will need to improve.
“Be a different sort of challenge, I’m sure. But I need to make more than nine birdies. Ultimately I created plenty of chances, and I only made nine birdies this week. Maybe early on I just didn’t hole the putts, as I said, and that kind of crept in. I didn’t seem to hit my putts with much confidence for the rest of the week, which is a pity.”
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