Future is now for McDowell

Irish OpenThe temptation for any professional is either to look too far ahead or to linger too long in the past. It's a mistake Graeme McDowell doesn't intend to make.

So, as he prepares for this week's Nissan Irish Open on the Montgomerie Course at Carton House, the upwardly-mobile golfer from Portrush, ranked 40th in the world, isn't casting any glances to next year's Ryder Cup, nor is he reflecting on a profitable campaign so far this season in America. It's all about the present.

Obviously, as it does for any Irishman, the 2006 Ryder Cup looms on the horizon. Much like the impending birth in a family, you know it's going to change things, it's just you don't know in what way.

Yet, the qualifying campaign doesn't even start until September.

"You don't want to make it too much of a blinkered goal to get on to the team," said McDowell, "because, at the end of the day, you're playing a lot of great tournaments and you want to concentrate more on those than anything."

As far as "great tournaments" go, the Irish Open is close to the top of McDowell's list in his desire to win.

Strangely enough, it's not a tournament he attended as a boy. In fact, the first professional tournament he ever visited was the Houston Open on the US Tour, and the only reason he went there was because he earned an invitation to play as winner of the South of Ireland amateur championship. That was in 2001, when he was a college student in Alabama. He has come a long way since.

Yesterday, relaxed and seated in a deck chair in the courtyard outside the clubhouse at Carton House that has been tastefully constructed in what was formerly a Real Tennis court, McDowell said: "I'd love to win in Ireland. I'd love to win the Irish Open. It's up there in my top-five, top-10 tournaments that I'd like to win. I'd love to win here or (the European Open) at the K Club."

To that end, he played the course for the first time a few weeks ago. "It's going to be a tough test. It's in great condition. The greens are very good, the rough's thick, and the bunkers are obviously very severe, so any kind of wind this week and it is going to be a very difficult test," he said.

McDowell, though, is one of those players who tends to go along with the adage of the tougher, the better.

"It takes a certain type of player to survive in tough conditions, you've got to be very patient. As we saw at the Forest of Arden last week, when it gets windy on a firm golf course there's going to be big numbers shot. The bunkering here is very severe. There's a penalty for hitting it in a trap, it's as simple as that. And, yet, they're not overly severe . . . I mean, they're big pot bunkers and you can get lucky and have a lie and have a go at it. The bunkering is very well done."

This season, McDowell's best work has been done on the US Tour; he has already secured his tour card for next season with earnings of $656,375 to comfortably head the non-members money list, almost $400,000 ahead of the next best placed player, Trevor Immelman. He has two top-10s, including a runner-up finish in the Bay Hill Invitational.

That moved McDowell into the world's top 40 and, basically, has given him licence to pursue what he terms his "A-schedule", a mix of the top tournaments on either side of the Atlantic.

It's the sort of itinerary he envisages will be maintained next year, with no immediate desire to play full-time on the US Tour.

Ironically, McDowell hasn't fired on all cylinders since he returned to play in Europe. His best finish was achieved in last week's British Masters at tied-16th, but the final round 66 there makes him believe his game is coming right.

"I was getting tired towards the end of my run in America, but I've worked pretty hard in the past week and feel that I'm back to pretty good shape again."

Much of that recovery process involved gym work, including treadmill runs of five kilometres a day to improve his cardiovascular.

"You don't get as mentally tired when you're fit," observed McDowell. "I've actually put on about half a stone in the last year, but I've lost body fat and put on lean muscle. I'm in much better shape now than I was a couple of years ago, that's for sure."

Part of his growing up has been an ability to meet the demands of playing on two tours, taking on board many of the lessons learned by his ISM stablemates Darren Clarke and Lee Westwood in the demands of juggling playing on two tours. McDowell, for one, believes the different demands of playing in Europe have helped.

"In Europe, we have to adapt a lot more to different conditions," he explained.

"Take in Italy (two weeks ago), we were playing in 25 degrees. Last week at the British Masters, you're getting your woolly hats out.

"In America, you can pretty much take one game with you everywhere. You have to be more adaptable over here. As far as your general game goes, you need more of a wind game and a bad-weather game. In the States, it's one dimensional, sort of bomb it, wedge it, putt it."

If life were only that simple on the Montgomerie Course over the next few days. McDowell knows it won't be, that a tough test awaits. The thing is, he's ready for it.