Rory McIlroy, the Masters champion, the latest winner of the career grand slam, a former world number one and a winner of five major championships, shot 81 during a practice round at Oakmont ahead of the US Open.
Feel better about yourself?
Last week was tough for McIlroy. A career worst PGA Tour finish at the RBC Canadian Open when he crashed out after two rounds, missing the cut by twelve, just days after carding an 81 around Oakmont.
What might shock you even more is that rather than alarm bells sounding in McIlroy’s head, he actually walked off the 18th green here thinking he played pretty much OK.
In fact, the 2011 US Open winner had to birdie the last two holes just to trim his score down to eleven-over.
Heavy rain in the latter part of last week and the early part of this has softened the golf course considerably and while it won’t be quite as much of a brute as it was, McIlroy’s score is an early indication of what might be possible at the US Open.
“It’s very penal if you miss,” he said. “Sometimes it’s penal if you don’t miss. But the person with the most patience and the best attitude this week is the one that’s going to win.”
He added: “Last Monday felt impossible. I birdied the last two holes for 81. It felt pretty good. It didn’t feel like I played that bad.
“This morning, it was a little softer. The pins aren’t going to be on three or four per cent slopes all the time. If you put it in the fairway, it’s certainly playable.
“But then you just have to think about leaving your ball below the hole and just trying to make as many pars as you can. You get yourself in the way of a few birdies; that’s a bonus.”
McIlroy isn’t the only Irishman to feel bamboozled by Oakmont after a practice round and if Shane Lowry’s example is anything to go by, pre-tournament embarrassment means nothing.
Lowry admitted that he walked in after five holes of his practice round in 2016 and couldn’t fathom how he was going to play the golf course. He held a four-shot 54-hole lead and finished second.
Safe to say he figured it out.
“We got around to 14, which is up beside the clubhouse, and I walked in.
“And I sat there in the locker room going, ‘I have no idea how I’m going to play golf around this place.'”
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