Rory McIlroy didn’t endure too many bad days in his upward trajectory to reclaim the world number one position, reaching the peak of the rankings again with his win in a successful defence of The CJ Cup; but, as if to underscore how small things can make a big difference, the Northern Irishman identified a missed cut at the Valero Texas Open as a changing point in his year’s work.
Unable to get back to Florida, with the Masters tournament the following week, McIlroy was confined to another overnight stay in a hotel in San Antonio where his day only got worse when told his room service order would entail a two-and-a-half hour wait.
“So I basically missed the cut, went to bed on an empty stomach and I was like, ‘let’s just wake up tomorrow and start again’. I don’t know why that sticks out but there was a couple of things happened that week. I changed my golf ball the following week and that definitely helped get me on this path. I played a new golf ball at Augusta and that was really the turning point to sort of turn the year around,” said McIlroy.
Since that ball change — to a TaylorMade TP5x — and a final round 64 at the Masters which elevated him to a runner-up finish behind Scottie Scheffler, McIlroy’s journey back to the number one ranking has been one of contending week-in and week-out which has brought with it three tournament wins, the Canadian Open, the Tour Championship and now the CJ Cup.
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“If someone had told me on the Friday night of the Valero Texas Open when I missed the cut that I would be world number one by October, I would have asked them what they were smoking because I would not have believed them. It’s just been a wild six months. I figured a few things out with my game and I’ve just been on a really good run. Everything sort of feels like it’s came together for me,” he said.
McIlroy can enjoy a three-week break from tournament play before taking the clubs across multiple time zones before teeing up in next month’s DP World Tour Championship in Dubai, where he will — from a position of strength — seek to add the European R2D title to the FedEx Cup he won on the PGA Tour.
Even by McIlroy’s own career standards, this has been a standout year despite being unable to add to his Major titles (not without decent efforts it must be said, with a runner-up finish in the Masters, eighth at the US PGA, fifth at the US Open and third at the 150th British Open). The CJ Cup win was his 23rd career success on the PGA Tour, while he moved to fourth in the career money list on the circuit with on-course earnings of $68 million. Tiger Woods is the all-time money leader with $120m but McIlroy has closed in on Jim Furyk, second with $71.5m.
[ Rory McIlroy returns to world number one spot with victory in the CJ CupOpens in new window ]
Now in his ninth stint as world number one, and regaining the top spot for the first time since July 2020, McIlroy identified last year’s CJ Cup success as a moment in time when he made it a specific goal to work his way back there:
“This tournament last year was the start of me trying to build myself back up to this point. I had a really rough Ryder Cup [at Whistling Straits], I’ve talked about that at length. I think I was outside the top-10 in the world [he was 14th]. It’s not a position that I’m used to being in. I think just the steady climb back up to the summit of world golf and what it takes, right, what it takes. And it’s not just me, it’s everyone that’s a part of my team. It’s not a solo effort. I just think about everyone that’s made a difference in my life obviously not over the last 12 months, but ever.
“Just thinking over that last 12 months, there’s a lot of people that deserve a lot of the plaudits and I’m the one that takes them, but there’s a lot of stuff that goes on behind the scenes that people don’t know about. All of that stuff combined is just as important as what I do out there trying to get these wins. It’s a team effort and I think whenever I think about that, that’s what gets me a little bit choked up and emotional because it’s really cool to be on this journey with other people that you want to be on the journey with. That’s a really cool part of it.”
