Rory McIlroy hit and hit, following a week where he nearly hit more shots than everyone.
On Monday, McIlroy said he hit at his home in Florida, doing so as longtime swing coach Michael Bannon and caddie Harry Diamond watched. On Tuesday and Wednesday, McIlroy hit on the range at Bellerive Country Club, site of this week’s BMW Championship. Across the two practice days, he hit 313 balls.
No, even six-time major winners aren’t protected from the occasional swing funk. Yes, even McIlroy has to dig himself out of it.
“Yeah, I’ve definitely gotten into some bad habits in my golf swing over the past few months,” McIlroy said Wednesday during his pre-tournament press conference. “Yeah, as you play tournament golf, you start, the golf swing takes a back seat and all you’re really trying to do is hit shots and be visual and be instinctive. But as you do that, you can start to revert back into some bad habits. And I’ve certainly done that this year. …
“But I spent the day at home in Florida on Monday, worked with my coach, Michael, and Harry, and we definitely, I feel like we’re heading into the right direction. But, yeah, I have this feeling in my golf swing that I just, I need to, I just need to engrain, and I just need to hit a ton of balls while doing it. Whether it be with the head cover under my right arm, or I’ve made a couple of clubs up with different grips to try to feel like where my hands should be halfway back. So I just have to hit a ton of balls to try to get that ingrained.
“That’s what’s hard. It’s hard to do that for three hours on the range and then try to go on the golf course and play like that as well. So I think the more reps I can get on the range, the more comfortable it will end up becoming when I get out on the course.”
All of it seems to have clicked, one week after he finished 66th out of 68 players at the FedEx St. Jude Championship. During Thursday’s first round at the BMW, McIlroy shot a six-under 64, which tied him for the lead. On Friday, he followed up with a 69, and he started Saturday’s third round five strokes back of leader Wyndham Clark.
But back to that quote a few paragraphs earlier. McIlroy has “made a couple of clubs up with different grips?”
He has. McIlroy said his ideal swing position is for his right hand to be on top of the club halfway back. So he fitted a lob wedge and a 7-iron with a Flat Cat putter grip at a 45-degree angle — and McIlroy said “halfway back, your right hand sits on the flat part of the grip, like on top, like where you would sort of want your grip to be, like where you want your right hand.”
And with that setup, he hit and hit.
“It just helps my right arm work better,” McIlroy said Friday. “Just the structure of it. Then the club gets more supported at the top. And then if I’m there, I feel like I can really hit whatever shot I want.
“So it’s more to help the right arm structure and sort of feel like keeping the right hand like on top of the grip more on the way back.”
If you’re interested in watching McIlroy’s range session from Thursday, the PGA Tour’s YouTube channel posted a video of it, and you can watch it here.
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