THE MEMORIAL TOURNAMENT PRESENTED BY NATIONWIDE

July 16, 2020

Rory McIlroy

Muirfield Village

Quick Quotes

Q. What were you doing hitting it so far left at 12 in the first place?

RORY McILROY: I played the wrong shot. I saw Tiger play a lovely little 7-iron in there and I tried to do the same thing. Sometimes when I try and hit like a shot that's less than full speed and trying to hit a draw, my lower body stops and my upper body just sort of smothers it and it goes left. It is what it is.

Q. What were you hoping for on the second?

RORY McILROY: Just give myself a putt for par, just somewhere on that proper -- because you know it goes up and over again, so just somewhere on that level.

Q. Sometimes when Tiger looks really good, he plays so quickly it's a joke. He walks up to the ball and plays the shot. Did you observe that today?

RORY McILROY: I think he's always had a wonderful cadence with his routine. He does the same thing every single time. I've always enjoyed playing with him because you can sort of feed off that. Yeah, he got off to a great start. He was hitting it nicely. He sort of had most things under control today. Yeah, I've always liked playing with him because of that rhythm that he has.

Q. Did you watch this tournament on TV last week?

RORY McILROY: I did, watched a lot of it.

Q. What did you think?

RORY McILROY: I thought it was great. I mean, the Sunday was probably the best TV I've watched all year. Obviously the scoring was so much lower compared to what it's going to be this week, but I thought it was really, really good.

Q. You can only speak for yourself here, but what do you think about the stark change it would have been for guys that played both weeks?

RORY McILROY: I sort of was thinking it's sort of like the Grand Slams in tennis. They're there for a long time, right. It's the two weeks of play, but they're usually there before that, so they're there for almost three weeks, so that's sort of probably what it feels like. Especially like Wimbledon, the courts deteriorate and they get firmer and they get crustier, so it's sort of a little bit like that.