HAMILTON, Ontario – Rory McIlroy was stuck in neutral during Thursday’s opening round of the RBC Canadian Open, and he had a good idea why. It was caddie Harry Diamond’s fault – sort of.
“A bit of a slow start,” McIlroy conceded. “Harry’s birthday dinner last night so had a couple of glasses of wine. I was probably feeling a little groggy when I woke up.”
With a 7:40 a.m. ET tee time off No. 10, that was understandable.
Could it have been a bit of a rust after a week off? “I certainly switched off,” McIlroy had said on Wednesday. “I went to one of my best friend’s wedding in Italy for four days, which was a lot of fun, good to see a lot of people from home I haven’t seen in a long time. Yeah, it was actually a really good trip, I needed it. Then I had a lovely, I had a great weekend at home. Spent time with my family and with Poppy and, yeah, it was awesome. So I needed that reset. I’m playing four weeks in a row here, so, yeah, I’m ready to go, but, yeah, it’s been a busy stretch and I’m sort of easing my way back into it. I probably hit a grand total of probably 150 balls last week.”
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After his round, McIlroy offered another reason for being stuck on the par train. He hadn’t seen the back nine this week, having only played the front during the pro-am on Wednesday.
“So I was sort of happy enough to get out of there in even par and not make a bogey,” McIlroy said.
He made nine straight pars to start his round, including at the par-5 17th, where he drove into a hospitality tent.
“Some guy yelled out, ‘You need a wrist band to get in here,’ ” McIlroy said. “So that was pretty funny.”
Once McIlroy flipped to the front nine, he also flipped the script and stuck a wedge to four feet at the first to break the seal. He added three more birdies to shoot 66. He dubbed it “a good day’s work.”
3 birdies on his last 4 holes 👀@McIlroyRory moves up to T4 @RBCCanadianOpen. pic.twitter.com/u3eIvZovUw
— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) May 30, 2024
In 2019, the last time the RBC Canadian Open was played at Hamilton Golf & Country Club, McIlroy fired a 61 to win by seven. The next day the course was ripped up for a renovation. Did they Rory-proof it?
“You can’t be quite as aggressive with the second shots, there are a lot of run-offs, there’s a lot of sections of the greens that you have to be careful about,” he said. “It used to be if you missed the green…
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