McIlory’s busy yr has been marked by thrilling highs and crushing lows.
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Forgive Rory McIlroy if his 2024 season has felt like a blur.
In a whirlwind marketing campaign that started in January with a victory on the Dubai Desert Traditional, the Northern Irishman has saved up a jam-packed schedule that may see him compete in 27 tournaments by the tip of the yr. Whereas his busy calendar has allowed for little let up, it has given McIlroy an opportunity to rethink how he goes about his enterprise.
Sooner or later, he plans to gradual it down a bit.
“I’m going to attempt to minimize it again to love 18 or 20 (occasions) a yr going ahead, I believe,” he stated.
McIlroy’s feedback got here within the wake of the Tour Championship, in Atlanta, the place he fired a final-round 66 to complete in a tie for ninth. The occasion was McIlroy’s fourth prior to now 5 weeks, together with the Olympic Video games in Paris, and his season isn’t over. He nonetheless has one other 5 tournaments on his ledger.
“I really feel just like the tournaments got here thick and quick, and clearly with the Olympics throw in there as effectively this yr, it form of condensed all the pieces a bit.”
McIlroy’s yr has been a rollercoaster, marked my emotional highs and lows. Together with Dubai, its peaks included a win on the Wells Fargo Championship, in Might, the place he chased down Xander Schauffele on Sunday for the title. However probably the most searing second of his 2024 marketing campaign got here a month later with a devastating loss on the U.S. Open, at Pinehurst, the place McIlroy’s stumbles down the stretch made room for Bryson Dechambeau’s heroics.
In Atlanta, McIlroy conceded that the consequences of that loss nonetheless linger.
“I felt like I hit a little bit of a wall form of post-U.S. Open, and nonetheless really feel a bit of little bit of that hangover,” he stated.
On the daybreak of his profession, earlier than marriage and fatherhood, amongst different obligations, McIlroy stated that he was higher suited to a go-go schedule. However a 27-tournament yr is now an excessive amount of.
“I’m normally form of like a 22 form of particular person,” McIlroy stated. “However once more, that was once I was form of in my 20s and didn’t have the obligations that I do now.”
At 35, he’s able to ramp it again. However he can’t simply but. He’ll be again in motion subsequent week on the Irish Open, at Royal County Down, and once more on the Alfred Dunhill Hyperlinks at St. Andrews, in October.
“It’s been a protracted season,” McIlroy stated, “and I’m going to simply have to consider attempting to construct in a couple of further breaks right here and there subsequent yr and shifting ahead.”
