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OMEGA DUBAI DESERT CLASSICJanuary 30, 2014Rory McIlroyDUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES MICHAEL GIBBONS:  Thanks, as always, for joining us. Start us off with your assessment with a fine morning's work, 9‑under, looked pretty good. RORY McILROY: It was good. Basically had the ball under control for the most part. Started, actually thought I should have made birdie on the first hole, the 10th. Just went over the back of the green and made par but after that got going. Yeah, I drove it well, which I've been doing and I can really take advantage of hitting it long and straight here. Got a lot of wedges into greens. So that's the key to my game like I've been saying the last couple weeks, and if I can keep doing that, hopefully scores like this will become more regular. Q. Stephen was asked how his playing partners were today and he said Tiger played well, but Rory was sublime, and he took motivation and a little bit of impetus. Nice to have a bit of commentary from your playing partners? RORY McILROY: Yeah, it is, it's always nice to be recognised by your peers. Stephen played well himself today, shot 6‑under par, a great way to start his defence to the tournament. We all played well. Tiger took a little time to get going but he managed his game really well the first nine holes and started the ball better on the back. It's always nice to get compliments like that. Sitting here a couple days ago in the press conference, or yesterday, and saying that when I shot 64 in '09, I came in here and Mark O'Meara said a few nice things about me. Especially back then, I wasn't quite the player that I am today. It gives you confidence. So it's always nice. Q. Where does getting back to world No. 1 feature in the grand plan? Out scoring Tiger, does that give you confidence? RORY McILROY: Yeah, I think World Rankings are‑‑ or getting back to world No. 1, it's a by‑product of playing well, giving yourself chances to win tournaments. You know, if I finish second in every tournament from now to the end of the year, I would be world No. 1, I won't be happy; I wouldn't have won. It's just a result of playing well and putting yourself into position to win and shooting good scores. So obviously it's a goal. It's a goal to get back there, but I have a few I guess more important goals to concentrate on that aren't anything to do with results or anything to do with finishes in tournaments or wins; it's to do with what I want to improve in my game. They are the goals I set myself, and if I can improve and reach those goals in that, then all the rest of the stuff I feel will take care of itself. Q. To No. 1 ‑‑ RORY McILROY: Yeah, seven is so bad‑‑ only six players in the world ahead of me‑‑ terrible. Of course, when you're used to being up there. Look, World Rankings are‑‑ it's more of an ego boost than anything else. You see yourself up there and you feel good about yourself but it doesn't matter. If you're in the Top‑50, you get into all the big tournaments and you have a chance to win, so that's very‑‑ what's important. But of course, getting up there and being recognised for being the best player in the world, or certainly one of the best players in the world, is nice. Q. Better driving than Abu Dhabi? RORY McILROY: Yeah, it was. Controlled my irons a little better, distance control was better. Wedges are still not where I want them to be but it's getting close. I feel like I have a new wedge in my bag‑‑ you can see how I'm driving it, I'm leaving myself a lot of wedges into the green and having that extra wedge is going to help in the long run I feel. Q. Best round since when, would you say? RORY McILROY: Not sure. I think shooting 66 to beat Scotty last year was up there. Yeah, 64 at the Deutsche Bank last year, 65‑‑ yeah, it's definitely the lowest round I've shot in a while but yeah, the way I controlled my ball and the way I played, yeah, it's definitely up there. Q. When you talked yesterday about how playing with Tiger could add a little spice to an 8.05am tee time, did that play a small part in terms of concentration, and were there one or two shots that really stood out for you today? RORY McILROY: Yeah, I mean, sometimes you have an early start, it maybe takes you a few holes to get going but whenever you have people on the tee box and cameras clicking, it sort of makes you more alert at that time of the morning when sometimes you're half‑asleep. Yeah, makes you a little more alert and a little more ready for it I guess. But yeah, shots‑‑ obviously the 5‑wood into the third hole, the par5, was the highlight of the day for me, making the eagle there. The 7‑iron I hit out of the bunker on the 12th hole to set up my first birdie of the day, that was great, as well. And just how I played the par 5s; I hit 5‑iron to the middle of the green on 13 to make birdie. Hit 6‑iron to the middle of the green on 18 and made birdie. So that was nice to take advantage of the par 5s off of the good tee shots. Q. When you saw that Tiger shot 79 last Saturday, was it your reaction, that, well, it just happens to everybody, or were you a little surprised? RORY McILROY: It happens to everyone. I think the way they set the golf course up last week at Torrey, as well; if you were just slightly off, it magnified those misses. I watched a little bit and the greens didn't look particularly good. I know that he 3‑putted a couple of times, and I mean, it's‑‑ when you leave yourself 3‑footers on those sort of poa greens and they get a little fast, a little bumpy, it's tricky. It happens to everyone. It's a tough golf course as it is. Obviously Tiger's played well there in the past, but it doesn't mean you're going to play well there every time. But you know, he didn't get off to the greatest start today but he really managed his game well and started hitting a lot of good shots on the back nine. Q. Midway through your back nine, did the course record ever come into your mind? And if you can maintain this form, the tournament record‑‑ RORY McILROY: Yeah, when I eagled 3 and that got me to 8‑under par, I guess I had six holes left and needed five birdies for the magical number. And then I didn't birdie the par3, the fourth, and then the fifth hole, I felt like I hit a really good putt there. Didn't go in, and that was when I thought, you know, if I can birdie the last five holes, I've done it before maybe; but no, I just‑‑ after that, I wanted to shoot 62 today. I shot 62 last week just a casual round of golf, so I wanted to try to shoot two 62s in one week. Wasn't quite possible; came up one short. Q. You shot 62 where? RORY McILROY: The Els. Q. My real question, what is your comfort level around here compared to the places you play pretty regularly and is there another venue where you feel you've had more comfort, more laps around the track, so to speak, because you've been coming here so long? RORY McILROY: Yeah, this is definitely up there in terms of courses I'm comfortable on. I think St. Andrews is another one. St. Andrews is somewhere I just feel‑‑ I feel at home at and I feel like I can shoot good scores there. Q. Why? RORY McILROY: I don't know, you just get certain golf courses, you just see the shots. You read the greens well. Just have a certain feeling. Q. With the corners and doglegs‑‑ RORY McILROY: Yeah, especially the ones that go right‑to‑left‑‑ really, any of them, the ones that are 300 carries or whatever, you can take on a little bit more than some of the other guys. Q. After the struggles of last year, does golf and life just feel easy again? RORY McILROY: Yeah, I don't think it's ever easy. It can feel easier than it has done in the past, but you still have to work hard. I realise that I've worked really hard in the last couple of months to get to this point and I've realized what I needed to work on, what I need to base my game on and around, and you know, it takes a lot of hard work and it takes a lot of hard work to maintain these levels, too. Okay, it may feel easy and these scores may, you know, look somewhat routine out there, but there's a lot of hard work that goes on behind the scenes to actually be able to go out ask shoot scores like this. MICHAEL GIBBONS: Rory, thank you very much. Well played. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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