Rory McIlroy defends giving Bryson DeChambeau the silent treatment at Masters
And explains why he tries not to watch his Augusta National 18th hole celebration
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CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Rory McIlroy isn’t sure why Bryson Dechambeau was surprised at the lack of conversation between them on Sunday at the Masters.
“I don’t know what he was expecting,” McIlroy said on Wednesday. “We’re trying to win the Masters. I’m not going to try to be his best mate out there.”
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Rory McIlroy defends giving Bryson DeChambeau the silent treatment at Masters Back to video
McIlroy held court at Quail Hollow, site of this week’s PGA Championship, and addressed the much-publicized silent treatment he gave the big-hitting DeChambeau in the final group of the Masters in April.
“Look, everyone approaches the game different ways,” he added. “Yeah, like I was focused on myself and what I needed to do. That’s really all that it was. It wasn’t anything against him. It’s just I felt that’s what I needed to do to try to get the best out of myself that day.”
Whether he was affected by the lack of dialogue or not, DeChambeau fizzled on Sunday and wasn’t a part of the storyline by the end of the day when McIlroy defeated Justin Rose in a playoff to complete the career grand slam and win his fifth major championship.
The image of McIlroy collapsing on the 18th green, heaving in tears will forever be engrained in the minds of golf fans who were glued to the thrilling broadcast that Sunday. But that won’t be the case for the man himself, who has made every effort to avoid watching the replay of his crowning moment.
“I’ve tried not to watch it a lot because I want to remember the feelings,” he said. “I’ve talked about this before, but I think when I rewatch a lot of things back, I then just remember of the visuals of the TV rather than what I was feeling and what I was seeing through my own eyes, so I haven’t tried to watch it back too much.”
The iconic image has been unavoidable for golf fans since the win, so McIlroy has caught glimpses of his emotional celebration.
“But anytime I have, I well up. I still feel like I want to cry,” he said. “Yeah, it was an involuntary. I’ve never felt a release like that before and I might never feel a release like that again. That could be a once-in-a-lifetime thing and it was a very cool moment.”
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