Rory McIlroy has implemented a dramatic change of equipment in the off-season – new irons, driver and fairway woods and a new golf ball – but hit the ground running with the same old verve in moving to the top of the leaderboard with an opening round of five-under-par 66 in the Dubai Invitational at the Creek Golf Club on the DP World Tour.
The Masters champion and world number two re-emerged from his winter break to get his season’s work up-and-running with an impressive opening round of seven birdies and two bogeys, explaining his move to cavity-back irons from blades for the first time in his career with the simple logic of, “if there’s help to be had, I’ll definitely take it!”
For his first competitive round of season, the 36-year-old Northern Irishman put a new TaylorMade Qi4D driver and fairway woods into his bag and also added new cavity-backed TaylorMade P7CB irons. He has also switched to TaylorMade’s new 2026 golf ball. The result? His 66 earned him the first-round lead in Dubai, a shot clear of Connor Syme and David Puig.
Having spent the off-season working with the new clubs, McIlroy remarked: “Overall, I like what I’ve seen at home, and today was a good test for it, and I felt like everything was pretty good.”
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McIlroy had Ryder Cup team-mate Shane Lowry for company in a convivial start to their seasons. Lowry – who had three birdies in his opening four holes – had to be content with a two-under 69 after suffering back-to-back bogeys on the sixth and seventh on his homeward run.
For McIlroy, there was satisfaction with his first round, a scorecard that featured seven birdies – on the 10th, 11th, 13th, 14th, 17th, 18th and first – for a strong opener, the longest of those birdie putts coming on the first, from 11 feet. The two bogeys, on the 12th where he three-putted, and the third, when his tee-shot veered right into trouble, were blips rather than any serious malfunctioning.
McIlroy had a year of years in 2025 – when he won the Masters to complete the career Grand Slam, won the Amgen Irish Open and starred in Europe’s away win at Bethpage in the Ryder Cup – but the equipment changes and his ongoing fitness work ethic provide proof of a desire to add to his achievements.
“I like the work. I like the process. I enjoy doing challenging things. And I think if you can make that the important part, and you just make that routine, then you don’t need motivation to do it. It’s your lifestyle. It’s what you do. And it’s, I guess, who you identify as,” he explained to Tim Barter on Sky Sports.
“And I identify as a hard worker and someone that likes to do those things, and I think the more and more you do that, the more it just sort of becomes who you are. And I’ve done it for so long now that if I didn’t do it, it would feel pretty foreign at this point.”
McIlroy was runner-up to Tommy Fleetwood when the Dubai Invitational was played at the Creek in 2024 (it wasn’t held last year) but Lowry, on his tournament debut, remarked: “It was all right. [It’s my] first round of the year, you’re kind of not really sure what to expect. I had a bad finish. But I played nice. I hit the ball well. It’s a tricky test. There’s obviously a score out there if you hit the fairways. You start missing fairways, it’s tricky and the ball gets away from you.”
Pádraig Harrington, playing on a sponsor’s invitation, opened with a 72 while Tom McKibbin struggled to a 74.
