Rónán MacNamara in Straffan
Seamus Power feels fit and healthy for the first time in two years and hopes his injury nightmare will give way to a fruitful fall season on the PGA Tour as he targets a victory to kick him on the road to Adare Manor’s 2027 Ryder Cup.
Power withdrew from the 2023 Scottish Open with a hip injury when he was ranked 50th in the world. A missed cut the following week saw him drop out of the top-50 and he hasn’t reached those heights since with several other niggles and a skin cancer scare adding to his woes.
Once ranked as high as 28th in the world and very much on the radar for the 2023 Ryder Cup team in Rome, Power is now ranked outside the top-150 and will need a strong FedEx Cup fall series on the PGA Tour to retain his card for the 2026 campaign.
But the West Waterford man is now brimming with optimism and after a month off he is ready to make himself known again at the K Club’s Amgen Irish Open.
“Pretty good now finally,” Power said of his health. “It was a funny year. I was getting a bit older, too many balls hit over the years and struggling to get to the bottom of it. I finally did, and during the summer I got some treatments on it and stuff like that. Probably the last six, seven weeks I’ve been a hundred percent for the first time in a long time.
“I can’t wait to get the equipment dialed back in, and to see some of the speed coming back, it’s kind of cool to see. I’ve never had a sustained injury like that before, and it kind of gets you really down and you wonder if you could ever really shake it. I kind of have a new enthusiasm for the game going forward.
“Really looking forward, this will be my first tournament out after three or four weeks off. So looking forward to getting going. Yeah, a fresh bill of health.”
Power had withdrawn from two PGA Tour events as he suffered setbacks on his way back from injury and he admits that it was a frustrating time mentally.
“There is, yeah, because you feel like you’re doing everything right. You feel like you’re doing everything the specialists are telling you, and all of a sudden you’re at practice and you look down and the club head speed is four or five miles an hour slower than it was the day before. It really gets to you after a while. You’ve got to try to stay positive somehow and try to get the right people around you, which I’ve been looking to do.
“It was just kind of an unusual spot. I’ve had injuries before. I had elbow surgery, and elbow sore before surgery, do rehab, four or five weeks later, you’re ready to get going again. This was the first kind of niggly one I had. It wasn’t bad enough to where you couldn’t play, but the inconsistency was driving me up the wall.
“You get to some funny places, where all of a sudden you’re worrying about things you wouldn’t worry about before. It’s nice to have that behind you now and kick on from here.”
The 38-year-old is looking to make up for lost time and although he will be 40 by the time the 2027 Ryder Cup rolls around in Adare Manor he has already turned his attentions to making a maiden European appearance.
“Every Irish golfer since that was announced, I feel like that’s been circled. That’s going to be huge golf.
“The last couple years have been frustrating. Look, it happens. It’s one of those things you can’t control. You do your best to get past. Starting in ’23, obviously things are cruising along. You never think it’s going to happen to you. You see it happen to other guys.”
But to achieve that goal, Power needs to start climbing the world rankings again and his main objective is to break back into the top-100 by the end of the year to give himself a proper footing heading into 2026.
“Yeah, if you’re still in the top 120, it’s kind of weird — top 100, basically, yeah, is where you want to be. The goal is going to be to get a win in the fall. I always say that. Obviously the season hasn’t been great so far, but in 12 days time, I could be having a great season. That’s the way I look at it, and that’s the way I’ve always kind of been able to at least trick myself into thinking like that.
“Four good rounds here and four good rounds in Napa next week, and things could be very, very different. You see that happen with guys, and I’m obviously planning that’s going to happen to me the rest of the year.
“I feel like it’s in a good spot. The game is really coming around. The weird thing about the injuries is the equipment gets messed up because the spin rate changes, the speed changes. You lose the mojo you have because you haven’t changed things in a couple of years and all of a sudden you’re tweaking stuff.
“All those things coming back together, it’s really exciting. Really looking forward to the stretch, and I feel like it’s going to be a good fall for me this year.”
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