‘The worst thing I did’…Rory McIlroy shares his biggest mistake before missing cut at 2023 Masters

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Rory McIlroy has opened up on the mistake he made which proved particularly costly at The Masters last year.

Rory McIlroy was one of the big names to miss the cut at Augusta National. It was only the third time in his career that the Northern Irishman has not made the weekend in Georgia.

The 34-year-old opened up a level par 72 in the first round. That left him seven shots back of leaders Viktor Hovland, Brooks Koepka and Jon Rahm.

Rory McIlroy opens up on mistake he made at 2023 Masters

Unfortunately, McIlroy was not able to go through the gears on Friday. He shot a five-over 77 to miss out by a couple of shots.

Ultimately, Rahm would go on to win the tournament with a score of 12 under. And speaking on Stick to Football, McIlroy admitted that he made a crucial error in the early stages of the second round that ensured that he did not make the weekend.

“A good one this year, I shot even par the first day which was like an average enough first day, but it wasn’t terrible and I was on the first green on the second morning and I saw that Brooks Koepka was coming up the eighth, and there is a big white scoreboard there by the eighth green, and I saw that he had already got to 10 under and I’m even par,” he said.

“It was only 19 holes into the tournament but I was there thinking, jeez, I’m 10 behind already I have to start pressing when actually what has worked best for me, is that I can’t control what he does or the leaderboard, and the worst thing I did that day is look at the leaderboard.

“If I hadn’t known, the winning score ended up being 10 under. I thought I needed to get there in 18 or 27 holes, when I actually could have said ‘okay, chill out, it’s fine, go and play your normal game and see where you’re at’. But I think whenever I have got into trouble, especially at that tournament, is when I start looking around and I’m like ‘ah, he’s doing this and I should be there’ and you start putting pressure on yourself.”

Grand Slam pressure surely a factor

You would think that McIlroy already puts enough pressure on himself at Augusta. He has been one win away from completing the career Grand Slam since 2014.

Of course, it was the 2011 Masters where McIlroy had the tournament in his grasp before struggling on the final day. He has achieved seven top 10 finishes in the tournament since then. But he will be aware that he may not have a lot of chances to win left while he is at the peak of his powers.

So he probably felt that he had little choice but to attack at the start of his second last year.

Hopefully, McIlroy is in a position where he does not feel that he needs to throw the kitchen sink at the tournament this time around.