GENESIS SCOTTISH OPEN

July 13, 2023

Rory McIlroy

The Renaissance Club

Quick Quotes

Q. Fabulous start in round one of the Genesis Scottish Open, you must be really pleased?

RORY McILROY: Yeah, really good start. I haven't had particularly great experiences around this golf course the last couple times I've played.

But I feel like my game is definitely in better shape than the last couple times I have played The Scottish Open. Great start. Controlled my ball nicely. Got off to a fast start obviously and the wind was getting up, and yeah, it was good. There was still a few things that I feel like I can improve on but at the end of the day, it's a great start, and I would have taken it before I teed off today.

Q. When you were preparing and coming into this week, was there one thing you can pull out particularly that you were focusing on?

RORY McILROY: I think trajectory more than anything else. Just trying to control my ball flight, knowing that you're going to have to play in conditions like this. When you play a lot in the States, especially when the greens get so firm and there's not a ton of wind, you're so used to having to hit the ball way up in the air to stop on the greens. When you come over here, it's a bit of a different story. Controlling the ball flight a little bit, especially with short irons and wedges, I've been trying to do a lot of that over the last couple weeks.

Q. You mentioned just a couple things that perhaps you would like to improve on. Could you share with us what those are?

RORY McILROY: Yeah, you know, a couple of tee shots -- I felt I drove the ball well for the most part, but I was sort of hitting quite a few toe balls, so just trying to find the center of the clubface a little bit more. But honestly apart from that, everything else, my putting felt pretty strong, and you know, again, having to adjust to sort of links greens, it takes a little bit of time. But I feel like I've got my eye in pretty well.