To borrow his friend Shane Lowry’s mantra, it is a case of “onwards and upwards” for Rory McIlroy in his quest to claim a fourth career win at the Tour Championship at East Lake in Atlanta, the final event of the FedEx Cup playoffs.
While the pot of gold that is the FedEx Cup bonus money was distributed following the BMW Championship at Bellerive – with world number one Scottie Scheffler scooping $23 million of the more than $100 million at play – the Tour Championship itself has a standalone purse of $40 million with $10 million for the winner of the 30-man tournament.
McIlroy’s improved performance in St Louis, finishing solo third after contending throughout the final round only for US Open champion Wyndham Clark to finish birdie-birdie-birdie for an impressive win, augurs well for his chances headed to Atlanta where the Northern Irishman has won three times (2016, 2019 and 2022).
“Overall encouraged with how I played this week compared to what it was last week [in Memphis], and certainly something to build ongoing into East Lake,” said McIlroy, who was tied with Clark through 15 holes.
“I always felt like I needed to just get my nose ahead to really try to put the pressure on Wyndham, and I couldn’t. We were tied there for a few holes, and then when he made that putt on 16 for 2 and I couldn’t answer, that was obviously a huge moment in the round and in the tournament,” added McIlroy.
McIlroy’s PGA Tour season will finish with the Tour Championship before he diverts back across to Europe, where he is playing in the Amgen Irish Open at Doonbeg and the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth. He is still not entirely happy with his swing fundamentals.
As he put it, “I’m not in a spot where I’m super happy with where my game is or where my swing is. So, I just have to keep working on it. But it’s nice to know even when I’m not super happy with everything I can still piece it together and get it around and still give myself a chance to win tournaments.”
Tom McKibbin the sole Irish player in the British Masters
Tom McKibbin, Tyrrell Hatton, Jon Rahm and Caleb Surratt of Legion XIII pose with the LIV Golf Team Championship trophy. Photograph: Justin Casterline/Getty
Tom McKibbin isn’t wasting any time in recalibrating from his LIV season – where he was part of the Legion XIII, alongside Jon Rahm, Tyrrell Hatton and Caleb Sturratt, which went back-to-back in the team competition with their season’s work finishing up in Indianapolis – to return to playing on the DP World Tour.
McKibbin is the lone Irish player in the field for this week’s British Masters at The Belfry, while he has the Amgen Irish Open and the BMW PGA Championship pencilled in for the coming weeks.
Of his contribution to Legion’s successful team defence, McKibbin tipped his cap to his team-mates: “It’s been great the last couple years getting to spend time with these guys. To get to play golf pretty much every time I play golf with the best players in the world has been pretty cool, and to win the team championship two years in a row is pretty special.”
For the rest of the year, he’ll be doing it for himself.
By the Numbers: 16
Indicative of the growing strength of women’s golf in Ireland, there will be 16 home players in the field for the KPMG Women’s Irish Open at The K Club (South Course) which starts on Thursday, led by Solheim Cup-bound Leona Maguire.
Leona Maguire will tune up for the Solheim Cup at the Women’s Irish Open. Photograph: Luke Hales/Getty Word of Mouth
“I’m going to be real with it; not everything was perfect. But for the most part we’ve done a solid job. If there’s one thing that I could say, it’s we did something different in the game of golf, and I’m proud of that” – Jon Rahm on LIV Golf, after the troubled LIV season finished up on Sunday in Indianapolis. What version LIV 2.0 brings remains very much up in the air, following the Saudi Arabia PIF’s withdrawal of financial support.
On this day … August 25th, 1996
Phil Mickelson enjoyed a standout season on the PGA Tour, with more wins than anyone, even if Tom Lehman would claim Player of the Year honours.
His success in the NEC World Series was Lefty’s fourth victory of the year and provided some solace for his spectacular collapse at the PGA Championship two weeks earlier, where he blew a three-shot halfway lead to finish tied-eighth.
Phil the Thrill didn’t make life entirely easy for himself at the Firestone Country Club in Akron, Ohio, but had learned sufficiently from his setback at Valhalla to close the door on his pursuers: Mickelson produced rounds of 70-66-68-70 for a total of 274, three clear of Billy Mayfair, Steve Stricker and Duffy Waldorf in the limited-field event.
Two late birdies on 16 and 17 in the final round enabled Mickelson to claim his fourth tournament of the season – adding to his success in the Nortel Open, the Phoenix Open and the Byron Nelson – and brought some relief, as well as a payday for $378,000.
“It’s important for a player’s confidence to close the deal,” admitted Mickelson of what was his ninth of 45 career wins on the PGA Tour.
Social Swing
Pretty frustrating as a female golfer to hear “we love supporting women’s golf/we want to grow the game”, yet every week there’s an example of the exact opposite. First it’s big brands investing in oversexualised influencers, now pushing over a woman is deemed good content – LET player Hannah Screen elegantly hits out at the Good Good Golf posting of the new Callaway driver. The social media post – with a man pushing a woman to the ground – was deleted after widespread criticism.
Fooch out on the course today, telling me North London’s that way and 3 pts for the @Arsenal – Justin Rose on the interaction with his caddie Mark “Fooch” Fulcher at the BMW in St Louis wasn’t all about the golf.
Know the Rules
Q: After searching for two minutes a player finds what they believe to be another player’s ball, so they continue to search for their ball. After the three-minute search time ends, it is then discovered that the ball the player found and believed to be another player’s ball was in fact the player’s ball. What is the ruling?
A: The player’s ball is lost because the three-minute search time has passed and they did not identify their ball in a reasonable time (Rule 18.2a).
In the Bag
Miyu Yamashita – CPKC Canadian Women’s Open
Driver – Srixon ZXi (9 degrees)
3-wood – Srixon ZX MkII (15 degrees)
5-wood – Srixon ZX MkII (18 degrees)
Hybrids – Srixon ZX MkII (22 and 25 degrees)
Irons – Srixon ZXi5 (6), Srixon ZXi7 (7-PW)
Wedges – Cleveland RTZ (48 degrees), Cleveland RTZ Tour Rack (52 and 58 degrees)
Putter – TaylorMade Spider Tour X
Ball – Srixon Z-Star XV