Robert MacIntyre, whose defense of his Italian Open title was ended by injury last week, has declared he is in perfect physical condition ahead of the PGA Championship at Oak Hill.
MacIntyre withdrew from the DP World Tour event at the Marco Simone Golf and Country Club, where the Ryder Cup will be staged in September, before the second round on Friday due to a back strain.
The 26-year-old from Oban had recorded his second professional victory in the tournament following a playoff with Matt Fitzpatrick 12 months earlier and was disappointed he was forced to pull out.
However, the Scot has undergone extensive treatment on the problem since and is confident he will be in decent shape when the second major of the year gets underway in Pittsford, New York, on Thursday week.
“I’ll be good to go next week,” he said at a media event to preview the Genesis Scottish Open in July at the Renaissance Club in East Lothian today. “I’ve seen the right people and am doing the right things. So I’ll get on with it.
“It’s far better. I tried my best when I was out there (in Italy). On the Wednesday morning, when I woke up I could hardly move, just from the way I’d slept. I’ve been in for physio yesterday and this morning and it’s feeling far better.
“If I’m being honest, I push as much as I can. I’ve had niggling injuries already this year, most recently my arm, and pushed through that. I pushed as much as I could on this one.
“I managed to get out in the first round feeling good. But I tried to hit a tee shot hard down nine and felt it going. I kind of tried to manage my way round after that, but I struggled late on in the first round.
“I then almost didn’t have enough time between rounds. When I woke up on Friday morning, I thought: ‘This ain’t good.’ I went into the physio room for about an hour then went out and tried to warm up, but the speed was that far down. It wasn’t good enough to go out and play.”
MacIntrye added: “The guys in the physio truck were absolutely brilliant. They’d said it wasn’t going to do any long-term damage trying to push through it. It was just a case of how much pain I could take.
“I could get through it with an iron, but when I was trying to hit a driver I was full tilt and the way I move the back wasn’t allowing me to tilt. I could have played with an iron, but it was too long a golf course to hit something soft.
“I’ve got a strapping on my arm as well because of the ligaments. I…
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