At the end of a long year, McIlroy addressed what he thought were a few faults in his swing, particularly on the backswing. So he spent three weeks swinging in a studio simulator, banging balls against the screen and unable to see the flight of the ball. With a monitor in front of him, the setup allowed him to engrain the feels and work solely on his body and swing movements without making corrections based on the shape of the shots. Only in the past week has he gotten back out on the course to see the progress.
“The only way I was going to make a change, or at least move in the right direction with my swing, was to lock myself in a studio and not see the ball flight for a bit and just focus entirely on the movement,” he told reporters Wednesday in Abu Dhabi. “I’m terrible at, if I’m trying to make a certain swing or change, and I start to mis-strike it or not hit the shots I want to hit, I’ll just revert back to what I was doing because it’s comfortable.
“I think doing this in the studio, it was a big key for me to just try to start getting the swing back to where I want it to be.”
McIlroy said he’s had a busy 18 months, and a hectic competitive schedule (next week will be his 27th start of the year), that hasn’t allowed him to dedicate the necessary time to make a change. McIlroy’s swing, he said, was too reliant on timing and his transition, and that the tweaks he’s making should help tighten some of the start lines and narrow his dispersion.
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“It’s something just to make my golf swing more efficient,” he said, “and if it’s more efficient, then it means it’s not going to break down as much under pressure.”
McIlroy, who enjoys a sizable lead in the DP World Tour’s season-long race, has won twice worldwide this year but his season likely will be remembered for his many close calls, most notably at the U.S. Open, where he blew a two-shot lead with four holes to play. Within the past few months, he has also squandered chances to win at the Irish Open and BMW PGA Championship.
“If I look at my year, the one thing that I would criticize myself on is the fact that I’ve had these chances to win, but when I’ve had these chances to win, OK, some may have been because of the putter, but others have been because of my ball-striking letting me down at a crucial point,” he said. “I think just trying to clean all that up so that whenever I do get under that pressure, I can have 100% trust in my swing and know what’s going to happen.”
McIlroy could clinch his third consecutive Order of Merit title, and sixth overall, with another strong performance in Abu Dhabi. He’s also playing next week in the season finale in Dubai.
“It’s probably still not quite where I want it to be compared to where it is inside,” he said of his swing. “But you have to find that balance between making the motion that you want, but also trying to hit the golf shot that you want as well. That’s why these two weeks will be a good indication to see where I’m at.”
