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OMEGA DUBAI DESERT CLASSIC

January 25, 2018

Rory McIlroy

Dubai, United Arab Emirates

Q. 65, looked pretty effortless. Was it?
RORY McILROY: Yeah, I don't think you could have got better conditions out there. The greens in the morning are perfect and there wasn't much wind for probably the first 12 or 13 holes. So you needed to take advantage of it today. Thankfully I was able to do that.

Q. 6-under through 12 holes but you didn't birdie the first, which was the 10th and you didn't birdie -- is that in your head at all?
RORY McILROY: No, I sort of started the same way last week in Abu Dhabi. I think I only birdied one of the par 5s on the first day but I knew there's so many chances out here and just tried to keep hitting fairways, hit greens, give myself chances. There's so many chances out here that I knew if I got into a rhythm that some would fall. I feel like I left a few out there but the end of the day, 65, you're not going to complain about that.

Q. On a happiness scale, when you had to stop playing last year to now, what's the difference?
RORY McILROY: Yeah, it's a big difference. I was a little bit not just down in the dumps because I was excited about the process of trying to get better and trying to get my body better, my game better, so I was excited about that. But not being able to play to my best last year was something way that's very frustrated with.

But from then until now, it completely different. I'm really happy with where my body is, where my game is and this is just a progression of what I've seen over the past couple of months, which has been nice.

Q. I know you have a plan. Are you ahead of schedule?
RORY McILROY: Yeah, I am. I didn't expect to play as well as I did last week, and it's been nice to continue that into this week. Yeah, I'm ahead of schedule right now, but I don't mind that. That's nice. Just have to reassess everything and go from there.

Q. All seems very seamless at the moment, another bogey-free round.
RORY McILROY: Yeah, it's been nice. Needed to work a little bit for that bogey-free round. Plugged it in the bunker off the tee on 12, so it was nice to have a long one for par there. But yeah, another good round of golf. Again, feel like I left a couple out there, if anything, but just keep giving myself chances.

Hitting it on the greens and within 20 feet, feel like I'm going to knock a few in and yeah, look, my game is in really good shape. I'm really happy where everything is and just a matter of trying to keep doing what I'm doing.

Q. From today is the most reassuring thing the fact that you picked up from where you left off in Abu Dhabi?
RORY McILROY: Yeah, definitely, picking up, especially on a benign day where you sort of needed to go quite low, it was nice to get off to a good start that way and sort of put yourself right in contention in the tournament straightaway. That's honestly one of my goals this year. I feel like started off last year a little bit sort of 71,70. It wasn't -- instead of getting right into the thick of things from the start. So it's been nice to start the last couple weeks like that.

Q. With Kyle Edmund doing so well in the Australian Open, potentially, he could be at the weekend going into the equivalent of the final day of a major, for you, the top of a leaderboard. Just wonder what advice you would give to someone mentally for the biggest day of their career?
RORY McILROY: Embrace it. Just embrace it. I didn't embrace my first chance at it at Augusta, and I went into myself. I went into my hell. I didn't -- I didn't relish the tint. I was a little bit intimidated by it to be honest. If I were him, embrace it. He's probably going to be playing Roger Federer are in the final. Hopefully, anyway. That would be great to see.

And he's playing against the greatest player of all-time with nothing to lose: Go for his shots. Not going to get too technical in tennis terms and tell him to start cutting angles and start taking the ball early, but just embrace it.

... ends

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