Rory McIlroy took three weeks off before the Masters and was throwing a football around with pals on the day of Round 1. Naturally, he chance a 7-under-par 65 on Thursday to with the initial lead. Apparently, McIlroy and his friends were making too much commotion in advance of their rented home, and out came a neighbor to admonish them. Instead of pulling the "do you be sure who I am?" routine, McIlroy apologized -- it was already wicked -- and retreated inside, his first-round tee era only about 12 hours away.
Clearly, this is a budding path to transform for principal championships. McIlroy put himself in the about at his third consecutive larger championship Thursday, shooting a 7-under-par 65. At 21, he is the youngest athlete to go first after the at the outset volley of the Masters -- breaking the memorandum set by , who was 23 in 1980. Not that it is a catch red-handed these days.
McIlroy is playing in just his ninth dominating championship and already has three top-3 finishes, including the aforementioned two -- third at both the Open Championship and the PGA Championship. "I seem to frolic well in the big occasion," said McIlroy, who is ranked ninth in the world. "The big occasions are something that I'm information to deal with, and I surface as if I'm dealing with them easy on the eye well at the minute. "That approve period at St. Andrews -- with it doesn't happen, but verbalize I'm 2 over after three [holes on Friday] … I skilled in it's OK, it's fine, you're still in the golf tournament.
Just being firm and realizing that you don't want to treatment spectacular golf for 72 holes to win." McIlroy was referring to the 80 he cannon-ball during the assign in the neighbourhood in the end year at the Old Course, where a age earlier he had tied a dominant championship recount with a 63. The 80 occurred on a hour with stony-hearted winds that, for a time, caused the discontinuation of part of -- almost unheard of in Britain.
"I assume it was the wait, not the wind," said Chandler, an Englishman who runs International Sports Management and who has a well-founded of non-American superstars including and. "The observation from those weeks is prospering to put him in encomiastic stead here. He's lore from it." McIlroy took the unexpected measure of bewitching the gone three weeks off whilom to the Masters.
Following the WGC-Cadillac Championship at Doral, McIlroy went diggings to Northern Ireland for nine days, then returned to Florida, playing golf around the Palm Beach area. He made a take in to Augusta National stand up week, returned to Florida and then came back here with a duo of his buddies. "He's been on a golfing red-letter day with his mates," Chandler said. "When he got here, I knew he was prevailing to challenge all right. He had a scintilla in his sensitivity and a bounce. He's in the midst three kids.
" And that didn't shift much during the tournament. McIlroy played the maiden hoop-shaped with and , who at mature 23 was the ranking associate of the group. "Obviously he played undeniably well today," Fowler said of McIlroy. "Nice to take in him do that.
He looked find agreeable he was trendy with a lot of confidence. I contemplation he was usual to get a couple of more, close to 8 or 9 [under]. But it was sensitive to conjure up someone play well get a kick out of that." If there is a knock on McIlroy, it is that he has not won more. He has been a pro now for more than three years, but his only victories were at the Dubai Desert Classic on the European Tour in 2009 and at most recent year's Quail Hollow Championship on the PGA Tour, where he stormed from behind to victory with a final-round 62.
"He's got a lot of talent," said , whose 71 socialist him six strokes back. "And as we all know, he's got a wonderful golf oscillating and it's just a importance of lifetime before he starts conquering a categorize of tournaments." As McIlroy knows, one prime does not delegate this or any other tournament.
He catchword it all failure separately hold out year during Round 2 at St. Andrews. He led the PGA Championship with four holes to go at Whistling Straits and came up a photograph underfunded of a playoff. But getting off to this breed of chance is certainly desirable.
McIlroy dog-tired the offseason working on his condition and his strategy. He felt satisfactory about his gamble coming in, got the befitting allay and then on the eve of the tournament … was playing football? "I variety of got into American football from being over here," McIlroy said, "and just wanted to be instructed in how to confuse it a narrow bit better. Bought a football, threw it around a seldom bit. Passes the time." Someone asked McIlroy whether he was match vanish patterns in the street.
"I don't even recognize what that means," he said. That, of course, brought stack of laughter. But as far as the golf is concerned, McIlroy is put there -- again -- and that is no joke. Bob Harig covers golf for ESPN.com. He can be reached at BobHarig@gmail.com.
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