2026-05-15 11:45:51
Rory McIlroy lamented his “wayward” driving as he made a disappointing start to the PGA Championship.
The Northern Irish golfer struggled to a four-over-par 74 in his opening round at Aronimink on Thursday (14.05.26) and felt that his lack of accuracy off the tee let him down.
Asked to describe his opening round, McIlroy told reporters: “S***.
“I’m just not driving the ball well enough. It’s been a problem all year for the most part. I miss it right, and then I want to try to correct it. And then I’ll overdo it, and I’ll miss it left.
“It’s a little bit of back and forth that way. So that’s pretty frustrating, especially when I pride myself on driving the ball well. I just need to try to figure it out. I honestly thought I’d figured it out.
“Coming in here, I hit it well on Sunday at Quail Hollow and then hit it good at home on Monday. Obviously had to curtail the practice round Tuesday, but hit it decent yesterday.”
McIlroy explained that “missing fairways” made it hard for him to register a competitive score and his troubles were compounded by a run of four straight bogeys to close the round.
The six-time major champion said: “I started missing fairways. I missed the fairway right on four, the fairway right on six, the fairway right on seven, fairway right on nine. From there, it’s hard. I didn’t have great angles either. Obviously you start missing it just off the edges of these greens, it gets tricky.
“I felt like I did okay. I made that birdie on five to get back to even-par after the soft bogey on four, then I just got on that bogey train at the end.”
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