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Rory McIlroy said that to win the Open in his home country would “define my career” as a unique achievement. It was thus pressure on a grand scale and when Rory didnt play well today the sadness amongst the home galleries was tangible. After a bad day at the office, which could have been a lot worse, I think we saw some of the best of Rory McIlroy today. Massive mental strength. Starting his first round at Royal Portrush with an horrendous quadruple bogey which included an out of bounds tee shot and an unplayable lie, we saw the best of Rory between holes 2-15. He battled and fought and held his round together in tough conditions at one point getting back to +3. But he admitted that a missed par putt on the 16 green which led to a double bogey affected his concentration leading to an awful triple bogey on the 18th.

He admitted that he had felt nervous on the first tee, being the home favourite with massive support, but it was the excited kind of nervousness, ready to get started. Unless it was deeply subconscious it’s too simplistic to put down his performance down to pressure. He acknowledged and appreciated the home support but admitted he had put himself into some bad positions due to poor ball striking, no excuses. The toughness he showed in the middle of his round showed his true mettle. Hopefully he wont internalise this too much, Jack once followed a round at the Open of 83 with a 66 the following day to make the cut. Perhaps we should all shrug it off as the wag who just suggested that Rory will be announced on the first tee tomorrow as from Jupiter Florida, where he lives, rather than a son of Northern Ireland, which he always will be. Just hope that he and G Mac take from this week a return to their true Irish speaking accents rather than the awful transatlantic accents they’ve both adopted since living in America. x marks the spot on the map of their accents.

Back to the drawing board with coach Michael Bannon and mind coach and short game supremo Brad Faxon.

The Dunluce course was the biggest star today. With driving rain in parts of today and a stiffer wind than was expected conservative play was needed with the thick rough, pot bunkers and slow greens. Accurate iron approach play was essential and players choosing to hit driver on maybe five holes. The galleries are enormous – 237,000 are expected over the week, the biggest outside of St Andrews.

The picture below of former Open Champion David Duval’s scorecard isn’t quite correct, the 15 has now been downgraded to a 13. As Emiliano Grillo also had a hole in one today, this major test, unknown to most modern tour pros,  has been throwing up all kinds of results. A fascinating watch not, noticing the rain.

Ahead of next month’s Open Championship at Royal Portrush here is Northern Ireland Tourisms digital tribute to Graeme McDowell, Darren Clarke, Fred Daly and Rory McIlroy at the mountains at Fairhead, County Antrim.

Unflappable Gary Woodland won the US Open by 3 shots from Brooks Koepka under relentless pressure from the PGA Champion, who didnt give up all day on trying to win a record three US Opens in a row, Woodland holed a 30 foot birdie on the final hole for a -2 69 271 total, the lowest score in six US Opens at Pebble Beach. Brooks Koepka had four rounds in the sixties but didnt win but was quick to praise Gary Woodland “he played a hell of a round today. He hung in there and win in style which was pretty cool”.

Gary Woodland has decided to make the trip to The Open at Royal Portrush even though his wife will be on bed rest with their second set of twins, both girls, due at the end of July.

Justin Rose has a large team behind him and this week his swing coach Sean Foley gave a few thoughts about what they were working on with him.

Justin has been putting phenomenally well this week averaging 24 putts per round, but his ball striking has been unpredictable.

Sean Foley says that when his striking gets loose it is because he is too far from the ball so they have been keeping him in tight to the ball. They have been encouraging him to take his time on the backswing, keeping it slow and deliberate, and keeping his hands and clubface into a neutral position so that he can hit the ball either way.

We’ve been hearing from the wrong people – the players – before and after the rounds. After hearing the incredibly interesting and insightful interview with top coach Pete Cowen, I’m now convinced we need to hear less from the players and a lot more from the experts around them, because sometimes the players don’t know how they do what they do, and sometimes even when they do they cant explain it to us. Their job is to do it, and lets take the pressure off them by not asking how they’ve done it,  Let’s get the mind gurus and swing and short game coaches explain what’s going on.

So Pete Cowen was approached on the practice ground at Pebble Beach and talked about his charge Gary Woodland who is leading after the second round of the US Open. Pete Cowen has been his short game coach for some time but now his swing coach Butch Harmon has decided not to travle on the PGA Tour so much Woodland approached Pete Cowen about helping him with his long game on tour.  Cowen says Harmon has coached him very well, there was little to change in technique, but he has helped hi  to understand his swing better so that when anything goes wrong he knows how to fix it, which has improved his confidence.

Of this week, Pete Cowen says Gary Woodland is controlling the ball flight really well, which is important in controlling distance. On Thursday  night his feet were moving too quickly. He couldn’t get the ground force to get into the delivery position to hit the shots he wanted to hit. So his shotmaking was unpredictable until he felt the ground better and swing better, he then played well and putted very well.

He said that Woodland’s short game had been 1/10 when they began and was  now 3/10 so a 100% improvement. This was because he did t have a simple chipping and pitching angle. When he simplified that his strike pattern became better,and he became a really good bunker player. Cowen said he has massive ability but does need more confidence and self belief.

As to Stenson, who he has been short game coach to for a long time, he said he thought that his form was “average”. He said “it’s all mental with Henrik. If he ceels comfortable he will playwell. He said that he is playing negatively, not having used driver all week so his approach shot will be with a 4 iron, when others will be using a 7iron, its difficult to be objective.

I am a huge fan of Matthew Wolff, his arrival on the PGA Tour is exciting, he says he is there to be a disruptor. He’s certainly given notice of that by winning the 3M Open with a swing like no one elses. The best amateur in the world in my opinion, had a very interesting film made before he turned pro, see this

At the 3M championship at TPC Twin Cities Wolff holes a 26 foot eagle putt on the final hole to beat Bryson DeChambeau by one shot for a -21 win. “My life just changed forever” he said. It’s only his fourth PGA Tour event and only his third as a professional. He becomes, at 20, the youngest winner since Jordan Spieth and like Tiger Woods and Ben Crenshaw part of an elite group to hold the individual NCAA title and a tour event in the same year.

Strangely, the Golfing Gods made a decision, that Matthew Wolff wasnt to enter the major championship stage until 2020. A tough twist of fate meant that the winner if the 3M title wasnt eligible to play at Royal Portrush even through three players got through from the Irish Open on the European Tour on the same week. This means something, the stage has to be cleared for him, and he has been held back so something special can happen in Ireland, like a home winner.

Martin Kaymer’s comeback this season, which led to him nearly winning The Memorial Tournament has been a great thing to see. On the European Tour’s media this week this very interesting interview appeared.

We all face the unknown in life. You don’t know what is happening tomorrow.You don’t know what phone call you are going to get from your family. You can’t prepare for that. You need to be spontaneous and have faith in your own life experiences that you can handle something. It is the same in golf. You have to believe you have what it takes to handle anything that comes your way. Knowing how good you are makes you not afraid of certain situations, but you also have to have a better understanding of life, have perspective and know your capabilities.

I am not the Martin Kaymer of 2010 or 2011. You need to have acceptance of where you are right now. If you look at the last six months, I am 100 in the world. I am not World Number One. This is where I am right now. The guy I need to beat now is the guy who is 99. It is not Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka or Justin Rose. Some players feel the need to be super confident and believe they are better than they are. Others are like me and think about their next step and that is what I need to do in order to get back to the top. If I was to compare myself with Justin Rose right now, it is a fantasy. Of course, it is possible I can become World Number One again. And of course, is it possible I can beat him this week in the U.S. Open, but to get back to the top takes time. It could happen any day, but in order to make it you have to relax. You have to accept the situation you are in right now.

My own mental approach is an intimate thing. I don’t really like to talk about exactly what I do. For me the best advice I got was from a Swedish guy I work with. I do Pilates with him and he also helps me with life coaching through understanding personalities, characters, human behaviour, fear, what drives people and what doesn’t drive people. He told me ‘you have to find your own way of creating calmness around you’. It is important to get rid of distractions. Unnecessary energy gets wasted. How

I try to avoid social media. It makes people think they are missing out on something. Comparison is one of the first things to limit yourself. You compare your life to theirs, but the life they portray is just a fantasy anyway. It is just the bits they want you to see. People start the day by looking at their phone to see the news or look at social media and it makes you compare yourself with other people. You start the day with negativity and feel down on yourself. Then you do the same at night before you go to bed.  It is just a distraction.

People underestimate the power of being in the moment. The other week, I was sitting in a café in Phoenix with a cup of coffee. Nothing else. Just sitting there. A couple came up to me and asked me if I was ok. I said, ‘why shouldn’t I be ok?’. And she said, ‘because you are just sitting here’. I thought, what am I supposed to do?  Should I dance? It’s so in our heads now that if someone just enjoys the moment, just enjoys the being, it is weird. People see it as not being normal, but who says being normal is good? Einstein was not normal. Barack Obama is not normal. To me, not being normal is a good thing. You try to create something for yourself. Being in the moment helps when you are on the golf course. Being aware of what you are doing, how you are walking, how you grip the club, it helps you be very much there. When I won the U.S. Open by eight shots in 2014, that was a week when I was in the moment as much as I could possibly ever be. The whole week. And I know how I did it, so I need to find my way back to that. It was nothing to do with being good, it was a mindset. There was no energy wasted that week. It was joyful. That mindset is what I am always aiming for. I know I can hit the golf shots, so it’s not about that, it’s about finding that total calmness on the golf course.

I can relate to Brooks Koepka when he said winning Majors are easier. I think 60 or 70 per cent of players are just focused on making the cut. You have people who qualified, who think I might never get back to the U.S. Open, or the Masters – I’m just happy to be here. If that’s already your focus, you are already limiting yourself. The ultimate goal is to win the tournament. That is why we are all here, you would think. But really there is only 20 or 30 per cent here to win. Some are afraid, some have other issues. If you have won a Major before, you create the belief. You don’t need to prove it to yourself. You just need to get your mindset in the right place and if the golf course suits you, you have a very good chance. Having the right mindset is hugely important at a place like Pebble Beach. You can use the beauty of the golf course to your advantage. If you just play the holes, it would be a shame. In the U.S. Open, or a Major, you think you need to do something special to win, but if you play your normal game you can do well.

My biggest mistake in golf was not giving myself credit for the success I had. I treated success and defeat almost the same. If I could give some advice to the Martin Kaymer of 2010, it would be to celebrate – whatever way that looks – my effort and my wins more. I had a hall of fame career by the age of 30, but I had no idea. You have to realise that to build on it and become even better. I wish I had understood how good I actually had become. You don’t just win two Majors by the age of 30. You don’t just become Number One in the world. That’s not normal. But for me it just felt like a normal part of the journey. If I could go back eight or nine years, I would tell myself to be more aware, to appreciate how good you are and understand what you have done. Thomas Bjørn actually said it to me once. We were on the ninth hole in Italy in 2015 in the pro-am. I hit a pitch and it went straight in the hole. A lucky one. Thomas came across and I said, ‘wow, how lucky was that?’. He said, ‘Martin, don’t forget how good you are’. Maybe he just threw it out there, but we do forget sometimes how good we are.