When was the last time Rory McIlroy played a major championship but declined to speak to the media, or even do a TV interview for each of the first three rounds?
The 107th PGA Championship at Quail Hollow has been flat at best, but it’s also been an indicator as to what golf might look like in the post Rory McIlroy Grand Slam era. Understandably, he doesn’t look too invested this week and a middle of the road finish won’t be met with sirens and the crisis talks that would have come his way had his major less drought continued.
Still, it would have been nice to hear from him regarding his driver head after he was asked to change it on Tuesday after it was discovered to be non-conforming.
McIlroy has struggled off the tee all week, hitting just four of fourteen fairways on Thursday while he drove out of bounds and found a lake on Saturday.
Results of driver conformity tests are supposed to be confidential but McIlroy was publicly named which prompted the PGA of America, who already have enough on their hands with this underwhelming leaderboard, to release a statement clearing McIlroy of any concerns of “intent.”
“The standard process is for about a third of the field to be randomly tested under the programme,” the PGA of America’s Chief Championships Officer Kerry Haigh said.
“That was the case at Quail Hollow this week.
“Finding driver heads that have crept over the line of conformance is not an unusual occurrence, especially for clubs that are hit thousands of times over a long period of time.
“The results are kept confidential to protect players, who are unaware the club has fallen out of conformance and not responsible for it falling out of conformance other than hitting the club thousands of times.
“Players are simply asked to change heads if necessary, and all do without issue. To publicly identify players whose club did not conform can lead to that player being questioned unnecessarily.
“Neither the USGA nor the PGA of America have any concerns about player intent.”
McIlroy has had driver conformity concerns before, he changed driver heads at the 2023 Genesis because he suspected it was close to the limit of the trampoline effect.
The “trampoline effect” in golf refers to the spring like reaction of a flu face upon impact, transferring more energy to the ball and increasing ball speed and distance.
This effect is maximised by thinner, more flexible club faces, which are a key feature of modern drivers. The USGA’s “Spring Effect and Dynamic Properties” rule, according to Knuth Golf, directly addresses this phenomenon and its potential for generating excessive distance
“They were testing drivers at Riviera, but I just didn’t even want to take the chance,” McIlroy said two years ago.
“I just was not comfortable knowing that it could feel – doesn’t look good on me, doesn’t look good on TaylorMade.”
There have been no such driver concerns for Scottie Scheffler this week who is third in strokes gained off the tee while McIlroy is 45th overall heading into the final round but was dead last after two rounds.
McIlroy was a three-time winner coming into the PGA at Quail Hollow – where he also has four career wins – and he was leading the strokes gained off the tee statistics during an imperious early season stretch of form that saw him complete the career grand slam last month.
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