{"id":411275,"date":"2025-09-09T20:02:25","date_gmt":"2025-09-09T20:02:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/411275\/"},"modified":"2025-09-09T20:02:25","modified_gmt":"2025-09-09T20:02:25","slug":"brooks-koepkas-irish-caddie-helped-him-climb-to-world-no-1-they-want-to-get-back-there-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/411275\/","title":{"rendered":"Brooks Koepka\u2019s Irish caddie helped him climb to world No 1. They want to get back there \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Who is Ireland\u2019s most successful caddie? From David McNeilly to Colin Byrne, from Ronan Flood to JP Fitzgerald to Harry Diamond, there are plenty of candidates. In terms of Major wins, however, there is one man on top of the pile – Portrush\u2019s Ricky Elliott. <\/p>\n

The 48-year-old has been on the bag for all of Brooks Koepka<\/a>\u2019s five Major wins. In fact, he has been there since the American\u2019s humble beginnings in the professional game \u2013 from the Challenge Tour to world number one.<\/p>\n

Easy-going and modest, Elliott is not the type to blow his own trumpet, but he is justifiably proud of his achievements in the game.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m very proud. Being a part of one Major is amazing, being a part of five Majors is a joke really,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s just unreal. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe all do the same job. We\u2019re like jockeys I think; if you\u2019re on a fast horse [like Koepka], you hold on to it, it\u2019s going to win.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome of the shots he\u2019s played down the stretch (his coach Pete Cowen interjects \u2013 \u201cthey\u2019re all down to me!\u201d), when these top, top players are playing well, it\u2019s like a video game.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou point and tell them where the wind is and he just does it. There are plenty of other caddies who do that and their player just isn\u2019t as good. It\u2019s the only way I can say it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Renowned coach Cowen, who has mentored several Major winners over the years, was on site with Koepka and Elliott at the Irish Open at The K Club<\/a> last week. Koepka made a solid start at the Co Kildare course but collapsed on Friday and missed the cut.<\/p>\n

It was a familiar story in a disappointing year for the former world number one. Koepka has fallen to 310th in the world golf rankings, which do not count LIV Tour<\/a> events. The alternative Data Golf Rankings place him at 219th.<\/p>\n

Cowen says the player\u2019s game has been \u201cvery, very good\u201d on the range, adding that he just needs to bring it to the course and \u201cget out of his own way\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"BrooksBrooks Koepka and his coach Pete Cowen. Photograph: Ross Kinnaird\/Getty <\/p>\n

\u201cHe doesn\u2019t usually search much, but we\u2019ve had a bit of searching this year. We\u2019ve gone back to the roots and it\u2019s all coming around quite nicely,\u201d Cowen said before the Irish Open, where Friday\u2019s ragged play showed there is more work to be done.<\/p>\n

Koepka likes straight shooters who tell it like it is. He gets that in abundance from Elliott and Cowen, who has also been with Koepka for 12 years. Caddie and coach changes are a dime a dozen in the pressured world of professional golf, so the trio\u2019s staying power is notable, especially given Koepka\u2019s recent struggles.<\/p>\n

\u201cBrooks is wise enough to realise he\u2019s had success with the team he\u2019s got and he\u2019d be sort of foolish to change it,\u201d said Elliott.<\/p>\n

\u201cFreshening stuff up every now and again isn\u2019t necessarily bad, but he\u2019s never been a tinkerer or a caddie-hater or a coach-hater; he\u2019s been very loyal to the people around him.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not saying by the end of this year he won\u2019t go with someone else. But he\u2019s had a few injuries, he\u2019s been up and down and we\u2019ve stood by his side with his knee injury on and off the course. We care about him getting well and getting fit more than being a great golfer. The relationship that me and Pete have with him is close.\u201d<\/p>\n

Koepka will play this week at the BMW Championship at Wentworth and the Dunhill Links in Scotland. With the LIV tour ending in August, the feeling was he needed to play more competition golf to get back to the top of the game.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the minute, the three of us feel it\u2019s a challenge to get to the top as that\u2019s where he should be, and he appreciates that,\u201d said Elliott.<\/p>\n

\"BrooksBrooks Koepka (right) and caddie Ricky Elliott on the seventh green during the second round of the 2022 US Open in Brookline, Massachusetts. Photograph: Warren Little\/Getty Images <\/p>\n

He still finds it strange to have seen his hometown of Portrush host the Open and it was a special event for him despite Koepka missing the cut.<\/p>\n

Elliott added: \u201cIt\u2019s like all your worlds collide, isn\u2019t it? Usually when you caddie at golf tournaments, you only ever see grandstands up. Portrush was the opposite, I know it without them up. Then all your mates you went to school with, all your family are there, everyone from the road. Everybody in your life there in the one week.\u201d<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Irish Open: Lowry and Koepka avoid the Ryder Cup elephant in the roomOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

He is most at ease when talking about Koepka and the success he has had. He says it is a \u201cprivilege\u201d to have been there as both a golf fan and as a part of the team. He points out how, in 2019, he finished first, second, second and fourth in the Majors, a year after winning two Majors out of three entered.<\/p>\n

Cowen jokes that he stopped Koepka winning three Majors in a row as he started coaching Gary Woodland in 2019 just before he won in Pebble Beach, with Koepka finishing second. <\/p>\n

\u201cOne person beat him at the US Open in three years. When you think about it, it\u2019s unreal. It\u2019s hard to sustain that, it\u2019s hard to quantify how he did that. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just about sticking to the basics and seeing where his golf can get him again, instead of trying to prove something. He\u2019s going to have a few more bites at it. The guy is only 35, people forget that. Phil Mickelson won his first major at 34.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"BrooksBrooks Koepka and his caddie Ricky Elliott line up at the fourth tee during the Masters at Augusta in 2023. Photograph: EPA – European Pressphoto Agency <\/p>\n

Koepka was quoted as saying about Elliott in 2019: \u201cUnder pressure, he knows exactly what to say at the right time, and that\u2019s what you want in a caddie. I wouldn\u2019t want anybody else on my bag, I know that. He\u2019s been tremendous. He\u2019s part of the reason why I\u2019ve had the success I\u2019ve had. And I love the guy to death.\u201d<\/p>\n

The feeling is mutual for Elliott, who was a groomsman at Koepka\u2019s wedding and says he is a \u201cgreat boss\u201d.<\/p>\n

Elliott says the key to caddying in big-pressure moments is to stay relaxed, but also to speak and act with conviction.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhether your advice is right or wrong, you better say it with conviction. You must be decisive for what you say at that time.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you say it\u2019s a seven iron at the tower, and he asks \u2018do you think it\u2019s an eight iron?\u2019, you say no, it\u2019s a seven iron at the tower. Stick with it, that helps them a lot under pressure.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Who is Ireland\u2019s most successful caddie? From David McNeilly to Colin Byrne, from Ronan Flood to JP Fitzgerald…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":411276,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4106],"tags":[33197,41160,2826,141423,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-411275","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golf","8":"tag-brooks-koepka","9":"tag-dp-world-tour","10":"tag-golf","11":"tag-liv-golf-invitational-series","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115176128429848494","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411275","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=411275"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411275\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/411276"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=411275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=411275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=411275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}