|
|||
|
|||
|
 |
|
|
ALFRED DUNHILL LINKS CHAMPIONSHIPOctober 6, 2010Rory McIlroyCARNOUSTIE, SCOTLAND MICHAEL GIBBONS: Many thanks for joining us here at the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship. We had Lee Westwood in a few minutes ago and we asked him for his reflections on Monday night but he couldn't remember much. So maybe give us yours. RORY McILROY: It was fantastic. As I said, when we wanted to share the moment with 11 other guys and to celebrate with them was fantastic. It was my first real experience of that. We won the Vivendi Trophy last year but didn't really let have much time to let it sink in a little bit. This time, we had a really good night and enjoyed ourselves, it was great. MICHAEL GIBBONS: Give us your overall impression of The Ryder Cup. RORY McILROY: Unbelievable exhibition. (Laughter). It's the best golf tournament in the world, by far. The whole experience has made me open my eyes and realise how important it is to everyone and it's become very important to me now. I've only played one, but as I said on Monday night, I don't want to miss another one. MICHAEL GIBBONS: This week, it's nice to come back to normality in a sense. RORY McILROY: It's going to be great. Playing with Dad again. We made the cut last year. Hope we can make it again. I don't think he's playing quite as well as he was last year, but as long as he gets his putts to the hole this year, that's all I'm worried. Q. Good did you get a bit of schtick from the other guys on the team for referring to it in the past as an exhibition? RORY McILROY: Yeah, I've been getting schtick for two years. I didn't feel as if I had to change my tune, but just the whole week last week made me realise how good it was. Q. Is it going to be difficult, this is a one-off last week, but is it going to be tough to lift yourself this week? RORY McILROY: I don't get a chance to play with my dad that much anymore, so any opportunity that I get, I really enjoy it. So that will make it a lot easier for me. Because, you know, you want to -- I think I'm 11th or 12th in The Race to Dubai. This is a big event, and you know, there's an opportunity here for if I play well to put myself into connection it. I know Martin is quite a bit ahead of everyone else, but if I can get a win here, that would make it a lot easier for me over the last two weeks to mount a charge for The Race to Dubai. Q. Your record here is pretty good. RORY McILROY: I'm playing St. Andrews on Friday, so that doesn't bode too well. Last time I played it on Friday, I shot 80. I'm looking forward to it. I love St. Andrews. It's one of my favourite places in the world and to play alongside my dad is even better. Q. It would be good to get a win in Europe, as well. RORY McILROY: It would be great to get a win in Europe and lift another trophy here. I've been a pro now for three years, and this is basically where it all started for me, got my Tour card here, and it would be great to win this championship. I've had a second and a third, so hopefully I can go one better. . Q. Lee has just been in here and told us he's not taken up membership of the U.S. Tour next year, even if he becomes world No. 1. I know you are, but are you still going to cut down on your schedule as you suggested? RORY McILROY: Yeah, I'm going to try to look to play 25 events or less next year, definitely. Q. In America? RORY McILROY: Yeah, just less sort of everywhere. Just shed a couple of events here and there and try and really make the events that I play in of -- you know, feel as if they are of significant importance. There's a few events this year where I sort of went to because I almost felt as if I had to. And when you're in that frame of mind, you are not going to play good golf. I want to try to go to every event I play next year and make it count and want to be there. Q. Do you think there should be more team events in golf? Would it be possible to create more? Or should The Ryder Cup be left -- RORY McILROY: Well, you've got The Ryder Cup and you've got The Presidents Cup. So the Americans get a chance to play team golf every year, and the Europeans get to play it once every two years. I think it's great the way it is. It just adds to the excitement. Everyone is going to be waiting for it for another two years now, and the closer it gets, the more the excitement builds. I think it's only good for the tournament that it is only every two years. Q. How many more have you got this year and what are they? RORY McILROY: I have got this, Egypt, China, Hong Kong, Dubai, Tiger's. So I've got six left. Q. How many will that make in total for this year? RORY McILROY: 29. Which is a little too much. Q. And can you tell me, what imagined you learnt about yourself last week, are there things that you learned going forward? RORY McILROY: Well, the first 11 holes on Friday, I was very edgy. I was very tight. I spoke to Martin Kaymer about it and he said he felt exactly the same way. We have a lot of similarities, both rookies, both went into The Ryder Cup with very high expectations. Martin obviously won a major and we are both in the Top-10 in the world. And it's amazing what having to play for 11 other guys does to you. You tighten up and you sort of, you don't want to hit a bad shot and it was -- I was very happy that we got called off the course on that Friday night, because I went out the next morning and played great and let myself go and just played the way I usually play golf. Had a good chat with G-Mac about it the night before and just said to him, you know, I felt tight out there today. He just said to me, "You just play the game usually play and you'll be okay." Q. Did you realise at the time how significant your half-point was going to be Monday when you got up-and-down or was it all completely lost on you at the time? RORY McILROY: Yeah, if I had of known how important it was, I probably wouldn't have held the putt. (Laughing). Yeah, I mean, that half-point was vital. Once I had left the first shot in the bunker, I knew I just had to get up-and-down, I just had to. Every point, every halve-point is important in The Ryder Cup, and we just needed enough to add up to 14 1/2 and that halve was pretty crucial in the end. Q. I was just going to ask you, how pleased were you for G-Mac, that he's now credited with holing the winning putt? RORY McILROY: Yeah, I mean, his year has just got better and better and better; from winning The Wales Open to give himself a great shot at getting on to the team; then to get his first major at the U.S. Open; and obviously to go on and handle that immense amount of pressure so well. I've said it before and I've said it for a long time; G-Mac is, in my eyes, probably apart from Tiger, the best player under pressure in the world. Any time he has to deliver, he does. I remember a 7-iron he hit against Jeev in the playoff in the Ballantine's, hit it to a foot. Every time he needs to come up, he does. That's the sign of a great player. Q. Lee is playing this week, and obviously he can be world No. 1 if he comes first; if he had not played for three weeks, he would become world No. 1 automatically. Is that something you admire or understand? RORY McILROY: Yeah, of course. I mean, I don't think Lee's missed this event for a long time. You know, he's had six or seven weeks off. I'm sure he's ready to get out and get back playing again. He's missed it for a while. Yeah, he doesn't want to let, I suppose, the chairman of the tournament down. He's playing with Johann Rupert this week. Yeah, he's ready to play and he wants to play, and I think he's going about it the right way in playing rather than just letting whatever happens, happen, and become world No. 1. He's actually playing, trying to prove that he is the best in the world. Over the last two years, he has been the best in the world. Q. Is that how other players look at him now? RORY McILROY: Yeah, of course. He's just consistently been up there for the last two years. You know, he's put a lot of hard work in on and off the golf course, and it shows. It seems like every time he tees it up, he's in contention. You know, he's finished second in two majors this year, and the year before finished a shot out of two playoffs. It's only a matter of time before he opens the door and gets that first one. Q. Your up-and-down in Dubai was obviously important in career; but if you had not got up-and-down on Monday and Europe had lost -- you probably don't even want to think about it I suppose. RORY McILROY: Yeah, I don't want to think about it. Yeah, it would have been -- if that had of happened, even if Stewart had held his putt for birdie, I was in a great position to make four, really. But I got it up-and-down and it turned out to be very important. My mood would have been considerably different if I had lost that match. Q. A couple of questions. First of all, what impact do you think will have the defeat on USA when you head to America next week, on how the crowds will react to you? RORY McILROY: I hope they react just the same. I mean, you know, The Ryder Cup happens once every two years, and I probably celebrated more on the golf course than I normally would. But that's playing with a crowd, as well. I think the Americans realise that we really had a home advantage last week and when we go to Medinah or hopefully I go to Medinah in two years' time; they will be having the home advantage and do the same thing. I don't think there's any gamesmanship in it. We all wanted to win. Q. Monty had a huge impact on the team; what pressure on Colin going into this event, having lost it two years ago, do you think that he deserves a place somewhere in years' time in Chicago? RORY McILROY: I think if he wants it, I don't see any reason why he shouldn't be. I thought he was great last week. He was very -- he gave us a lot of motivation, a lot of passion. You could see at times he was under an immense amount of pressure, but, you know, we played well for him when we needed to and won that third session, won that third session 5 1/2 to a halve, probably the best session in a Ryder Cup ever for Europe. He was great. He made a speech on Monday night when we got there, gathered the team around, played a video for us, which I thought was very -- it got us all going and it was great for him to do that. Every time we had a team meeting, he spoke so well. He wanted to take advice from all of the players, all of the vice captains. Made everyone feel a part of the team. It was very important that he did that with six rookies on the team and made everyone feel equal in there. Q. You say you hate to think what it would have been like if you had left that putt, but unfortunately for Hunter Mahan, he's a guy who what's in that position, and what did you feel for him? And on Monday night, were people pumping him up all over the place Monday night? RORY McILROY: Yeah, the Americans were definitely putting their arms around him. It wasn't Hunter's fault that America lost the Ryder Cup. It doesn't come down to one player in The Ryder Cup. It's all 12 players that really have to make the difference. It was just unfortunate that Hunter was left in that position. But you know, he was 2-down with two to go anyway. Even if he had hit that chip close, G-Mac rolled it up close anyway. It would have been a halve. He definitely shouldn't let that shot get to him or whatever. I think what really killed him was that he didn't play that great over the first 15 holes. I think he only made a couple of birdies and didn't really get anything going. You have to be really solid against G-Mac in match play. He doesn't really give you anything and doesn't really make that many mistakes. I thought, yeah, it's unfortunate when a lot of the pressure and a lot of the blame get put on one player in a team event, because it's not -- that's not the way it is. It down to all 12 to perform and luckily we just performed that little bit better last week. Q. Just going back to your tribute to G-Mac, about handling pressure, can you pick his brains with regard to it, or is it just a combination? RORY McILROY: I think because he's played so well in pressure before, he thrives on it, and he does well on it. And yeah, winning, it's a habit. I think we said last week, if you're comfortable being uncomfortable on the golf course, that's the best way to describe it. And he's comfortable being uncomfortable. You know, he handles it better than a lot of players. I think that's just something that comes naturally to him. The best shots I've ever seen him hit are what he needed to produce it most. It's great that he's able to do it and it's something that I wish I would be able to do as much as he does. Q. I understand that Tiger came to the European Team room afterwards; did he offer his warm congratulations? RORY McILROY: Yeah, he was fine. He was just holding court on a table tennis table the whole night. Him and Phil were dusting everyone off. I think they combine better as a table tennis team than golfers. (Laughter). I think the Americans were -- I thought, as well, the Americans handled the loss with a lot of class. I thought Corey Pavin and all of the team members, they were very gracious in defeat. That Monday night, they were great. We had a really good time together. And everyone was in great spirits. I think Hunter was probably the only one that was very disappointed, and you can see why, but it was great. And I felt the camraderie the whole week, obviously we wanted to beat each other, but at the end of the day, it's the Ryder Cup and it should be played in the right spirit. And I think it was. Q. Did you play Tiger? RORY McILROY: Did I play him? I hit a few shots but I think I was a little too intoxicated to do any good. Q. Did you watch? RORY McILROY: I watched a bit. I watched a few of the matches, yeah. It was good. Good fun shouting abuse at him. Q. What was your abiding memory of the whole experience? What's the one thing that flashes into your head? RORY McILROY: There's a lot. I think just coming down that 16th, on the last day with G-Mac, he hit it about 330. He doesn't hit it 330. He hit just such a good drive and then to hit the 6-iron to ten feet -- and Monty told him, as well, on that fairway, "Rickie Fowler has just birdied the last and Edoardo has the halve. You need to win this match." And after he made birdie on 16 and three on 17. I mean, I didn't think it was the right thing to do, but you couldn't help it, the crowd obviously gathering on the 17th green was pretty special. And the walk back to the clubhouse was pretty cool, as well. Q. There's been a lot of talk about the weather last week, and it was difficult for everybody and four years' time in Gleneagles, the weather may be worse; is it imperative to sort out the schedule for The Ryder Cup? RORY McILROY: I hope so. I think it would be great to play a week or two after the US PGA, you know, end of August, start of September. Just because the weather is just that little bit better. But it's up to the scheduling, and with these new Playoffs and the PGA Tour, it makes things a lot more difficult for the European countries to stage the event, just because the weather just doesn't really sort of agree with the date. Q. Should the U.S. Tour look at that and say, the credibility of the Tour is at stake? RORY McILROY: The PGA Tour has nothing to do with The Ryder Cup though. It's the PGA of America, and that's the thing. It's a huge thing for Europe. I think it definitely is something they need to get right, because in four years' time at Gleneagles, it could be pretty bad. If they know it is going to be that date, I don't think it hindered The Ryder Cup in any way to play it over four days this year, even though it wasn't supposed to, even just start on the Thursday, end on the Sunday could be an idea, so even if you have the with either, you have a day, that little bit of margin for error are. MICHAEL GIBBONS: Rory, many thanks for joining us. End of FastScripts |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
About ASAP Sports •
FastScripts Archive •
Recent Interviews •
Captioning •
Upcoming Events •
Contact Us
FastScripts | Events Covered | Our Clients | Other Services | ASAP in the News | Site Map | Job Opportunities | Links |
|
ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297
|