Rory McIlroy has already begun his preparation for the next major championship.<\/p>\n
McIlroy, just days removed from his T-32 finish at the U.S. Open at Shinnecock Hills, was at Royal Birkdale in Southport, England, on Thursday ahead of the July 16-19 Open Championship.<\/p>\n
McIlroy told reporters last Sunday, \u201cI\u2019ll be playing some links golf this week probably coming up,\u201d though he didn\u2019t specifically note that it was a scouting trip to Birkdale, which will host its first Open since Jordan Spieth won in 2017.<\/p>\n
Nick Faldo, who will work the major for Sky Sports, was also at Birkdale, ran into McIlroy on the course and recorded an impromptu interview with his fellow six-time major winner.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s good to get up here and play early,\u201d McIlroy told Faldo. \u201cI\u2019ve been trying to do that at every major championship, which is working out for me…Try to play a bit of links golf, try to get used to these conditions again.\u201d<\/p>\n
McIlroy, who spent considerable time at Augusta National prior to this year\u2019s second Masters victory, noted that the course was \u201ca little bit different\u201d compared to nine years ago, most notably a few different holes and some new green complexes. The fifth hole, a drivable par-4, was \u201ccompletely different,\u201d according to McIlroy, who tied for fourth at Birkdale in 2017. He didn\u2019t qualify in 2008, his first full year as a pro.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve always thought that Birkdale was one of the best in the Open rota,\u201d McIlroy added.<\/p>\n
McIlroy will next compete in the Genesis Scottish Open, which will be held the week before The Open in North Berwick, Scotland.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rory McIlroy has already begun his preparation for the next major championship. McIlroy, just days removed from his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":761389,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[443],"tags":[49,48,622,82],"class_list":["post-761388","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-golf","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/761388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=761388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/761388\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/761389"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=761388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=761388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=761388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}