Sport

The ongoing battle to get the balance of my game right

TEE TO GREEN: Things have started to look up recently with back-to-back cuts made in my last two outings

CIAN CURLEY
Tue Aug 23 2011 - 01:00

TEE TO GREEN:Things have started to look up recently with back-to-back cuts made in my last two outings

LIFE FOR me on the Europro Tour is, I suppose, akin to a young soccer professional getting onto the books of Accrington Stanley in Division Two of the English League. You get to find out about life on tour – mostly the harder but probably most honest side of grafting – but always with the dream and the aim of moving onward and upward.

Like any fledgling professional soccer player in the lower reaches, I’m striving to learn and to move on. And you take hope and inspiration from what others achieve, like the Rory McIlroys and Darren Clarkes of this world who have achieved so much this summer but who have taken the routes to get there at different speeds.

Last night, I got a glimpse of the other, upscale side of professional sporting life. On this occasion, it was as a spectator – attending the Manchester United versus Tottenham match at Old Trafford – with a few of my fellow pros and it was just nice for a change to break away from the normal preparation in a tournament week to experience the atmosphere at the ‘theatre of dreams’.

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Over the summer months, as the Europro Tour moved around Britain and Ireland, I experienced some level of frustration with my game in actual tournaments. For instance, I won one pro-am (in Fota Island) and finished second in another (at Galgorm Castle) but didn’t take that form with me into the actual tournaments. How do you put your finger on things? Was I more relaxed in the pro-ams? Is that the way to get the mind set in tournaments?

The added frustration came from missing the cut in three out of a stretch of four tournaments by a single shot. You hear a lot about the fine line between success and failure but that was taking things a bit far, especially when a a missed-cut means the difference between getting paid (however small the sum) to not getting paid at all.

Anyway, things have started to look up in recent weeks with back-to-back cuts made in my last two outings on the Europro Tour – in Formby Hall and at Lingfield Park – and an awareness that I could have scored event better. In Formby Hall, for instance, I had no fewer than 14 birdies and two eagles over three rounds which is the sort of scoring that should have you winning or at least contending. Unfortunately, I also had 14 dropped shots over the three days and that explains why I didn’t manage the top-five finish that so many birdies should bring.

Still, that high number of birdies meant I moved on to Lingfield Park knowing that my game – which was due a turn for the better to be honest – had more good than bad going on. I’d been playing well for quite a while and just not doing it when it mattered.

I went to Lingfield determined to cut down on those dropped shots. And I did. But, also, I didn’t manage to get the number of birdies that I had managed the previous week.

Hopefully I can get the balance right at this week’s Network Veka Classic in Mottram Hall in Cheshire, which is the penultimate event of the regular season on the Europro Tour. After this, I have the upcoming Integral Collection Classic at Huntley Hall in North Yorkshire after which the top-60 make the end-of-season Tour championship where there is double prizemoney on offer. I still have that to aim for.

But I also have an eye on the European Tour’s qualifying stage and I have decided to take a different route from what would probably be considered the norm. I have chosen to play the First Stage of European Tour qualifying in Germany rather than in England, the main reason being that there is the tournament at Huntley Hall the previous week and it means I will be heading to Stage One on the back of a competitive outing which should have me sharper.

I think one of the reasons for my upturn in performance in recent weeks – apart from all the work I’ve been doing on the range and the short game – is that I had new shorter and stiffer shafts put into my driver and fairway woods at the Titleist fitting centre in Carton House and that has definitely improved my game and given me greater confidence.

Hopefully that will pay some dividends in Mottram Hall over the next few days.

* Cian Curley is in his 'rookie' season as a professional, playing on the Europro Tour – a developmental circuit in Britain and Ireland – which offers a stepping stone to the European Challenge Tour.