THE STORY
OF RORY

Rivalries were fierce between Holywood Gold Club and Royal Belfast with its reputation for haughtiness, pro-Protestant members, Catholic barman and keen golfer, Gerry McIlroy, was encouraged to bring his son to the course after finishing his work at the bar in Holywood.
He was often seen hitting balls with Rory sat in his pram.
At 10 months old, Rory was crawling around on the tee.
By the time he was two, Rory had plastic clubs and balls of his own, a typical rite of passage in many Northern Ireland homes.
But instead of flinging the toy club into the shed and moving on, Rory’s fascination with golf remained steadfast.
He hit the balls so hard the plastic clubs broke and eventually Gerry and his pals cut down a proper club for him.

And with it, the toddler hit a 40-yard drive and his obvious talent was honed from the earliest days by Gerry, a four-handicap golfer, who coached him in the ways of the game.
He recalled the youngster asking virtually every day to be taken to Holywood Golf course.
And family stories about that start relate that young Rory received a golf club as a present before being shown the correct grip by his dad.
That club was taken to bed where Rory fell asleep with it, his hands holding the club perfectly.
At just seven years old Rory joined Holywood Golf Club, a no-frills affair that stood in contrast to the nearby haughty Royal Belfast Club.
The Holywood committee changed the club’s membership rules to allow Rory to become their youngest member and he quickly proved himself precocious and worth the punt. Today Rory still retains Holywood Golf Club as his home course.
When he was eight he gave an interview saying he wanted to be a best golfer in the world and win all the majors.
And it looked like all those nights spent watching Nick Faldo’s video on golf technique had sunk in.
Aged nine, and now on the junior golf circuit, Rory hit his first whole in one and within months he had scooped his first significant international victory in the World Championship at the Doral Golf Resort & Spa in Miami, Florida.

And weeks later he appeared on UTV’s Kelly Show, where he vowed the audience as he juggled a ball on his wedge before chipping a golf ball into a washing machine just like he had practiced so many times at home.
That was the day he told the world his favourite Irish golfer was Darren Clarke and TV host Gerry Kelly made a clever prediction.
He said: “If the Americans have Tiger Woods, we have young Rory.”
Rory started his early training with Michael Bannon, previously the golf professional of Holywood Golf Club, who is also his current general coach and dedicated mentor.

WHEN Rory McIlroy isn’t out on the course or on the range perfecting his game, you’ll likely find him in the nearest gym.
In the last number of years, the Holywood golfer has undergone a transformation from that little boy with the wild curly hair to the ripped, six-pack, bulging biceps golfer who became the first ever in his sport to grace the cover of popular fitness magazine Men’s Health. But how did he do it?
In autumn 2010, McIlroy started working with exercise physiologist Dr Steve McGregor and just a few months later he won US Open by a significant margin so it’s clearly had a positive impact on his game.
But not all the critics agree. In 2016, US Golf Channel analyst and fellow professional Brandel Chamblee, voiced his concerns that McIlroy is putting his body through too much in the gym, and how he fears a repeat of what happened to McIlroy’s childhood idol, Tiger Woods.
He said: “I say it with a lot of trepidation, because it’s a different era for sure and I don’t know the full extent of what he’s doing, but when I see the things he’s doing in the gym, I think of what happened to Tiger Woods.
“And I think more than anything of what Tiger Woods did early in his career with his game was just an example of how good a human being can be, what he did towards the middle and end of his career is an example to be wary of.
“That’s just my opinion. And it does give me a little concern when I see the extensive weightlifting that Rory is doing in the gym.”
Not going to take the criticism lying down, McIlroy hit back: “I’m a golfer not a weightlifter.”

A look at Rory’s gruelling training schedule:

5:30 am Wake up — light breakfast
6:30 am Gym. Running & mobility training/stability exercises
7.30 am Eat larger breakfast with recovery drink
9:00 am Course/Practice
12:00 pm Lunch
1.30 pm Course/Practice
4.00 pm Mid-afternoon snack
4.45 pm Main workout
6.30 pm Dinner
10:00 pm Bed

WHEN a baby-faced McIlroy emerged to tussle among some of the biggest names in golf, everyone was keen to know more about this golfing protege, who he was, where he came from and everything else in between.
So attention as it so often does then turned to his personal life. In those early days, McIlroy was supported not only by his family but by his childhood sweetheart Holly Sweeney.
The pair met at school, with Sweeney becoming McIlroy’s first serious girlfriend.
She was always by his side during those early days as a junior golfer when he left school at 16, right through to when he began to hit the big time.
But after six years together, the pair split in 2011 just before the British Open. A statement at the time from McIlroy’s management company stated the split was “amicable” Sweeney later revealed in an interview that she had been left “heartbroken” by the split saying, “I never thought he would do this to me”, as he went to to date tennis star Caroline Wozniacki.

But as time as passed, the pair have rekindled their friendship with McIlroy even purchasing a pair of Nike booties for Sweeney’s newborn baby Max in 2014 before tweeting a picture of the tot wearing them, saying: “Brought my little buddy Max his first pair of Nikes last night! Great seeing you guys @JeffMase3 @HFCSween.”
Soon after his split with Holly, McIlroy began dating Danish tennis ace Caroline Wozniacki. The pair got engaged in December 2013, but just 5 months later, McIlroy called off the engagement just months before the wedding.
His split from Wozniacki was less than amicable and definitely more public, with the former world number 1 tennis star claiming that McIlroy ended the relationship via a short phonecall adding that she was “shocked” by his decision to call time to the relationship.
In a short statement released following the split, McIlroy said: “The problem is mine. The wedding invitations issued at the weekend made me realise that I wasn’t ready for all that marriage entails.”There is no right way to end a relationship that has been so important to two people.
“I wish Caroline all the happiness she deserves and thank her for the great times we have had.”

Perhaps learning his lesson from such a public split from Wozniacki, McIlroy’s relationship with soon to be wife Erica Stoll has been much more low key with the couple rarely speaking in public about their relationship, preferring to keep things private.
The two met when Rory nearly ruined the Ryder Cup Miracle at Medinah by oversleeping, and Erica was the PGA employee who came to his rescue before police rushed him to the course that morning in September 2012.
It was only in an interview last year that McIlroy spoke openly for this first time about their relationship. He said: “The nice thing thing about mine and Erica’s relationship is that it started out as friends.
“We were friends for a couple of years and we knew each other sort of from the golf circuit, and in summer 2014, towards the end of the summer, started to spend a bit more time together and it went from there.

“We spent Halloween together and then the next day we went for a bit of brunch.
“We actually bumped into my dad, but my mum and dad knew her anyway so that was OK.
“It was actually a little pub in Florida down from where we live, a wee place called The Thirsty Turtle and I can even remember what we were eating.
“And we were sort of seeing each other for about a month and I didn’t really ask her out, I just sort of said, ‘yano what’s going on here?’ ‘Where’s this going type of thing?’.
“And I think she was conscious that she didn’t want to pressurise me into anything because of what had went on with me, but I was all for it.”

Rory was brought up in a red brick, three bedroom house in Holywood, Co Down.

In 2009 Rory bought a three-year-old house in Moneyreagh in Co Down and put it up for sale in September 2012 with an asking price of £2m.
Then 23, he said the five bedroom property was on a 14 acre estate and had a gymnasium and a golf practice area, complete with a putting green and driving range was a special place he had enjoyed.
But he decided to sell it due to his increasing overseas professional commitments as a world ranked No1 and spending up to 50 weeks a year playing international tournaments.

He told prospective buyers: “I have really enjoyed living here. It is a really special place which has allowed me to relax and unwind - when I get time.”
In December 2012, Rory bought a $10 million property in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, located close to Jack Nicklaus’ The Bear’s Club.