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WGC HSBC CHAMPIONS

October 24, 2018

Rory McIlroy

Shanghai, China

BRIONY CARLYON: Delighted to be joined here with Rory McIlroy.

Welcome back to Shanghai, Rory. We missed you last year due to injury, but your record around here is quite something, five Top-10s in your appearances. Just what do you love about coming back here?

RORY McILROY: Yeah, it's nice to be back in Shanghai. As you said, I've played well here in the past. I haven't quite got the win, but I've consistently finished quite high and I feel like it's a good golf course for me. Traditional par 72, four par 5s, a couple of drivable par 4s, so with my lengthy feel like I can take advantage of that.

But yes, good to be back, and I'm in a much better place this year than I was this time last year in terms of injury, and I've played very consistent golf. Maybe haven't quite had the wins I've wanted but I have three tournaments this year to try to add to that, so I'm excited for this week and the next few weeks, as well.

BRIONY CARLYON: You mentioned about that busy year, as well. This is the first time we've seen you post-Ryder Cup. How do you go about it coming off that win from the team perspective and now shifting back the focus on to your game and moving ahead.

RORY McILROY: Yeah, I mean, I guess I feel it's much easier to adjust back to this than going the other way.

You know, we play one Ryder Cup, what is it, every 104 weeks. This is our bread and butter. It's what we're used to, so I don't feel like I've had any trouble transitioning back.

Obviously coming off the high of what was an incredible week for The European Team, and you know, Ryder Cup, it's the best week of the year, by far, win or lose. You get to spend some quality time with a lot of people that you really like, and I guess that's quite rare in the game today because we all have different schedules and travelling all over the world and have all of our sort of teams and entourages around us. So to just get the 12 guys in the team room and spend some good time is always great.

Yeah, it was nice to have a few weeks off. It's been a busy year, but I did some good practise in Florida and just tried to get myself ready for the next few weeks, and as I said, hopefully I can finish the year off on a high.

Q. Currently sitting fourth on The Race to Dubai. With Nedbank and Dubai on your schedule coming soon, how important is it to perform over the next few weeks to try and challenge for that third Race to Dubai title?
RORY McILROY: Yeah, third or fourth? Fourth. Yeah, look, I know Francesco has got a big lead over all of us, really. I think I'm just under two million Euros behind or two million points behind, so I need to, obviously this is a big event, a lot of points and money up for grabs, the same as Nedbank and Dubai.

Yeah, I feel like I need one win, maybe two out of the next three, to have any sort of a chance. So you know, I'm playing with Francesco the first couple of days, so it's good to keep an eye on him, I guess.

But yeah, I mean, I need to play some very, very good golf over these next few weeks to at least have a chance. If I can go there, if I can go to Dubai with a mathematical chance of winning, you know, you never know what can happen. Still open to it, but I know it's a long shot.

Q. Since you have become the world No. 1, afterwards there's a lot of golfers that went on to become No. 1, and particularly, in this year, the race for world No. 1 is quite dramatic and there's a lot of changes. So what's your plan and what's your strategy to become the world No. 1 again?
RORY McILROY: Yeah, you know, it seems as if those -- there's four guys that have sort of separated themselves for that race. You've got Brooks, DJ, Justin Rose and Justin Thomas. Their points average, I think I'm maybe two points behind. I'm in fifth; I'm two points behind fourth.

My thoughts on the World Ranking have been the same, you know, forever. You know, playing good golf and winning golf tournaments takes care of your ranking. That's all there is to it. It's very simple.

I think it's a good barometer to see where you stand in the game of golf right now, but it's obviously a great accolade and a great honour to be world No. 1 and I'd love to get back there one day.

It's not a goal, because there's other goals that you want to attain and achieve, and if you do those then that No. 1 ranking is just a byproduct of all those other goals that you achieved.

I don't have any real desire for that. I obviously want to get back to No. 1, but it's about winning golf tournaments and playing well and playing consistent golf.

Q. The course looks an absolute picture, beautiful condition. Do you look at it and think, yeah, I can't really wait to play this, it's such a nice course to play, and does it suit the big hitters?
RORY McILROY: Yes and yes. It is, it's in great shape. I played nine holes yesterday. It's a little bit different this year. I think we talked about it last night; they haven't overseeded the rough, so the rough is that claggy bermudarough. But the rest of the course has been overseeded. The greens are bentgrass. The fairways are overseeded with rye, I guess, so they are very nice to play off.

So I think, yeah, it does suit the long hitters because of the four par 5s and the two drivable par 4s, but you need to putt your ball in play. So you need to hit it long, but you also need to -- you can't hit it all over the place here. You need to put it in play if you want any chance of scoring well.

So it's a balance. You know, there's holes that you're going to hit driver and try to get it up there, but there's also holes that you know that the most important thing is to get it in the fairway, like the third hole just over there. You can hit driver and get it close to the green, but you know, you've got more of a chance of getting it close to your second shot by hitting an iron off the tee and putting it in the fairway and giving yourself a full shot in; it's a balance.

It's a great golf course. I think every golf course suits a long hitter because it is quite an advantage these days, but I think this course has got a great blend of having to hit it accurately and control your distance with your iron shots. You know, it puts you under some pressure with some of the second shots with water or some difficult green complexes.

It's a great course. It's one of the best golf courses I've played, definitely, in this part of the world.

BRIONY CARLYON: Thank you, Rory, for your time and all the best this week.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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