What Makes Rory McIlroy So Compelling For Sports Fans?

0:00The last word with life pharmacy over 100 local pharmacies nationwide that are always here to help life pharmacy live better together well next week it's the masters and of course the scene of a remarkable glorious triumph by Rory McElroy last year Rory McElroy Ireland's greatest ever golfer you could say Ireland's greatest ever sportsperson is the subject of a terrific new biography by our next guest Alan Shipnock Alan's been with us previously about books he wrote about Phil Mikkelson and also about the disruption caused by lived global professional golf but he's now written Rory the heartache and triumph of golf's most human superstar Alan Shipnock thank you very much for joining us I'm delighted to be here thanks for having me it is a terrific read there are so much I'd forgotten over the last 20 years of Rory McElroy's career and it's nearly 20 years now as a professional at this stage but I want to start by actually asking

1:00you about the last chapter because there will be many people who will be watching the masters next week to see if Rory McElroy can defend his title and I think they deserve to sort of remember what was one of the most extraordinary final days in sport you've been a little golfer for a long time tell us a little bit about what made that day last year so extraordinary well it wasn't really a round of golf it had very little do with birdies and bogeys it was watching this great champion and the angels and demons that were on his shoulder and this sort of metaphysical battle I mean people for I think probably forget that Rory shot the low round of the day on both Friday and Saturday at the masters he was playing the best golf of his life he was in total control of his golf ball and his emotions and and then you come to Sunday and he hit some of the worst shots in master's history and also some of the best

2:07and it was just absolutely riveting to watch him try and bring out from within himself this this victory that he's he's chased his whole life and that meant so much to him and so you know I say this in the book it's like the reason that that victory resonated so widely with so many people you know Rory as a transcendent talent and none of us can hit a golf ball the way he can but that victory was about much more basic things it was about believing in yourself it was about never giving up on your dreams about overcoming your fears and that's completely relatable no matter who you are and what you do for a living and so I think that's why the whole world got swept up in it it wasn't because he wanted golf tournament it was because he conquered himself and all his doubts and all his fears and and it just made it so thrilling to watch

3:09and it's thrilling to read as you go through the chapter and the book as well what was also fascinating is and you start the book in some respects with this as well as dealing with it in that chapter and a lot of people thought that he was going to then suddenly be liberated and that we the man who hadn't won a major title since 2014 would suddenly be back in contention to win everything that the demons were been exercised and yet he seems to have gone into something of a funk for the rest of the year including one Falmouth had tiraded you and practice area before he came to Kildare and the Irish Open last September and it seems that maybe he didn't expect it but the love that he got from people here in Ireland seemed to just lift him again absolutely yeah you Rory had a little existential crisis after he won the masters it's it's relatable you know after you spend your whole life chasing one thing and then you get it

4:09and you know now what do you do next and it took him a period of months to figure that out and there's no doubt that the the Irish Open was was a very very important piece of that to to come over there and you know show off the green jacket for the first time ever in public in Ireland and the warm embrace of the home fans and all all the love he felt and all the support it just really it just really ignited his passion for golf and it refocused him on you know who he is and and what he does which is provide thrills for golf fans and and that victory was so epic with the eagle put on the 72nd hole and then winning the playoff and and you can see how visibly moved that that Rory was and you know his comments after that were so insightful you know he said I'm just so happy I could do it for these people who've supported me you know it was it was much bigger than him it wasn't a personal triumph it was for everybody else um I think that's when you know there's a lot of great voices in this book I think

5:13and you know Paul McGinley's one of the best and he he he was so insightful about Rory to me and um you know he said when when Rory when his heart is on fire when when he's chasing a goal that's when he's at his best and you could see his heart just ignite there at the Irish open and of course he carried that form into into the right or cup where he was a towering figure he went on to win the race to Dubai which is you know the order of merit as we used to call it that's uh he's chasing the all-time record there it's very important to him and so yeah he had a little swoon during the summer there's no doubt but uh Rory's back and of course he's been a little slowed down by this this back injury but uh he's he's hardly done I think there's a lot more thrills and store for golf fans by way of Rory in the in the years to come very soon you mentioned Paul McGinley because Paul McGinley does feature prominently in the book

6:15he said about how confident he was that Rory McElroy would be a driving force for Europe in the right or cup last autumn but there's a really interesting bit early on but Paul McGinley also talks about the influence that Darren Clark had on him but more so on Rory McElroy living the sort of the superstar lifestyle and not a teenage Rory McElroy aspired to that to the big houses the fast cars the champ in lifestyle sometimes you know maybe a sports psych psychologist worry about players getting distracted but the way you paint it in the book it seems that that actually gave Rory McElroy something to aim for as much as winning the titles yeah it's well documented that you know he came from kind of a working class family and you know Jerry and Rosie McElroy they they put it in an incredible amount of effort into supporting Rory's golf and you know he as a kid he played in in Florida and Hawaii and California and they wanted to expose him to the

7:16best competition and for him to have the best equipment and there wasn't much left over for all the other goodies and and so you know Rory he hungered after that material success it's part of what drove him early in his career and yeah Darren Clark was a symbol of that because he lived large and Rory aspired to that and you know he the McElroy still loved the finer things in life you know the the watches the cars the mansions the jets you know Rory of course but Jerry too he loves that stuff but what's important is they still remember you know where they're from and they still retain that that sort of humility and so with someone else like maybe an Ian Polter with his Ferraris it can be a little off-putting it's like he's he's showing off but with Rory it's more understated it's just more like I worked my whole life and these are some of the rewards but

8:21it doesn't really define him in the way that it probably did Darren Clark and some other athletes because I you know it I think pretty quickly once Rory had everything he wanted he realized it's not about the cars and the houses it's about the trophies it's about legacy it's about history and that's what he's been chasing and when you do that the material rewards will follow but that's not that's not what drives him and of course that's part of why he was never interested in live golf it it was about the history of the game it wasn't just about taking a bag full of money so I think I think there's no doubt that was a motivation early in his life but I think he he transcended that a long time ago he's only 36 and yet he's been around in the sporting consciousness for so long winning the silver medal is the best amateur in the open in 2007 the year potter carrington won the overall award and turning pro very quickly after that what is

9:23striking about the book is that so many of the names have changed he's gone through on us a number of eras in professional golf where various people who challenged him during the 2010s have now gone are largely irrelevant he has had relatively few physical injuries although clearly he's had a back issue going into the masters next week psychologically what is it about him that's managed to keep him going for the last two decades or so since he turned pro and how much longer do you think he'd be interested in doing that yeah there's there's a sort of a rory is managed to retain the sort of childlike joy at playing golf and he's he's talked about this many times that there's there's periods when he's he's kind of lost that he's had to rediscover it and you know he said after you know him and Shane Lowry won the team event in in New Orleans a couple years ago that that just sort of rekindled that that joy of just playing with your friend

10:27and trying to try not to let them down and and try and hit shots for the team and not just for yourself and of course you see that in the right or cut as well and I think that's fundamental you know it professional golf can be a grind and you can see with a lot of players the pressure the scrutiny the the travel the being away from home all these things it turns into a job for them and they lose some of that joy and and I think Rory is managed to retain it because he just has a love affair with golf and it's it's what he was put on this planet to do and he recognizes he has this gift and then he wants to fulfill it and I think he almost feels an obligation to to to be the best he can be and so that that's really important and I don't I don't think that's going to go away you know at this point in his life he Rory cares deeply about his place in

11:30golf history he he reads about golf history he venerates those who have come before him and he he hungers after the crown jewels of the sport he wants to win an open at St Andrews he wants to win a US open at Pebble Beats he wants to win an open at Port Rush you know these are these are the things he's chasing and I get into all this in the in the last chapter of the book you know I there's zero doubt in my mind that Rory's already one of the dozen greatest players of all time when you look at their record and and yet you can you could say as good as he is and as many times he's been there five major championships doesn't feel like quite enough and I think Rory feels that and he every time he wins one he goes up the ladder on the all-time greats and I think he wants to keep ascending and I think he's motivated by that but there's all these sort of complications in his sporting career in that the word the phrase course management comes out a number of times in the book it's sort of a golfing cliche but suggest in there are times when you

12:33have to not accept the punishment of a bogey and not look to get a par when a double bogey becomes what happens but at the same time isn't part of the genius of Rory McRoybean that he is and does best when he tries to do all of the things that he has the ability to do and if it doesn't come off it doesn't come off but if you try and stop him from doing those things he's not going to win anywhere exactly you have to be who you are as a golfer and you know tiger woods for all his power and some of the amazing recovery shots that people remember in the final analysis was a pretty conservative golfer because tigers are very meticulous personality when it comes to his golf away from the golf course that's the whole other yes but the way he played the game was very precise and it was about avoiding mistakes and I was I've been at all 15 of his major championship

13:34victories and it was thrilling to be a witness to history but a lot of them were boring because he would just snuff the life out of the tournament and there was this sense that he would never going to make a mistake no matter what and that's how a lot of them played out you know Rory is a much more impetuous character and that's carried him to many victories and is probably costume a few but he can't be anybody else like he has to play the game the way he knows how and the way he's programmed and you can't argue with the results he's done something that only five other players in history have done so while he's always going to rue the ones that got away ultimately it's the victories that he'll be remembered for and there's been a ton of them so I think Rory's been smart to safeguard you know his golf swing he's never changed his golf swing for the most part little tweaks and improvements but he's he's he's known that this is who he is that's

14:38his golfing DNA and he goes back to it every time and it's the same with with his style of play I mean if you think about the last round of the 2022 open at St Andrews and that that's one of the losses that's really burns Rory and his fans like he turned very conservative in that round you know he had every green but he was playing away from flags he he was he was playing percentage golf and it cost him because Cam Smith was attacking and making birdies and Rory's making parts and by the time he realized what was happening was too late and so I think that was also a lesson for Rory like ultimately he should have gone out there and tried to shoot 63 and blow away the field and so he is who he is that's part of it makes him so fun to watch when he has a lead it's it's never over till it's over I mean we saw that in Augusta last last year but that's just who he is in the way plays a game and I think that's why people are so drawn to him okay this loads more in this and fortunately I don't have time to talk to you

15:40about about how he's grown up and public effectively about you know having to have his personal life particularly relationships with women become the subject of tabloid father and there's lots as well that's really interesting I mentioned the money earlier but the business is he's developed on how you say he's on his way to being a billionaire just one couple of things are just to finish Alan did he give you any help for the book or did you need it given that you'd interviewed him many many times before you told him that you wanted to write the book yes I don't I don't want to spoil anything but I mean the book begins I'm flying over China in a private jet with Rory I mean I've had some great access to him through the years when he signed his Nike deal I was an Abu Dhabi and spent a lot of time with him so I did have a lot of material squirreled away and of course I did want to sit down with him for this book and Rory thought about it and ultimately declined and and that was his prerogative but in some ways that that freed me up because if we

16:44had sat for for these long interviews Rory so charismatic he I probably would have fallen under his spell and and and written a different you know slightly different book perhaps and I think as a bographer it actually helps to have some distance from the subject and you can see things with clear eyes and you can you can give a really honest you know accounting and in Rory's had some controversy in his life you know in his business life and his love life it's all in the book I think it's handled respectfully but the in the final analysis I think it's a feel good story you know Rory's he's conduct himself with great class dignity in growing up in in the in the spotlight and I think at heart he's just fundamentally a good person and so I tried to capture all of that but also being honest about the other stuff and just presenting it to the reader and you know I don't want to legislate to to the reader how to feel you know even with a filmickels in biography

17:45I was happy to seeing his praises you know his philanthropy and his random acts of kindness and but I was also honest about his flaws and his demons and I think you know when you come to these books hopefully I'm I'm just the tour guide for the reader of a person's life and you take from it what what you will and I don't want to tell anyone how to feel but I did I did want this book to have a different tenor than than the film book and it does because you know Rory's just a more likable personality and then the final analysis okay is he going to win next week in August I know it's almost impossible to say who's going to win but you think does he have a really good chance of retaining it now that he's finally won't I think he's going to win by eight shots I think that Rory's going to go on the first tee on Thursday and there's a chance he'll just be flat emotionally you who will be this he just won't be able to summon the magic because he'll

18:46feel a little spent or it's going to be the easiest round of golf he's ever played in his life because there's no pressure and he knows he can do it and I feel like he's going to shoot 63 or he's going to shoot 77 and it's kind of a how a microcosm of how Rory indeed his entire career I've just been told that I've been speaking to you for 18 minutes which is probably apt that we should finish there on the 18th so Alan Shipnock the book is a great read Rory the heartache and triumph of golf's most human superstar Alan thank you very much for being with us thanks for having me I appreciate it the last word with life pharmacy over 100 local pharmacies nationwide that are always here to help life pharmacy live better together