The golf fans in South Africa know how to show up.
Especially when the world’s No. 2, who wants to be the world’s No. 1 is in town to make his 2017 season debut.
Rory McIlroy packed the placed Thursday at the Glendower Golf Club. It looked basically like the City of Ekurhelni told everyone to take the day off and go watch Rory.
They were there in force, four deep in a lot of areas.
Made last week’s Tournament of Champions look like no one showed.
They were there for Rory, who came to start his season as a favor to the ever-popular Ernie Els, a nearby neighbor back in Jupiter, Fl.
Rory didn’t let anyone down.
He played with Brandon Stone, defending champion at this BMW sponsored South African Open. They also threw in Euro Tour stalwart George Coetzee.
But they came to watch Rory, no one was kidding themselves about that.
After four straight pars on the back nine, where he started, Rory let loose with four straight birdies that got him to four-under par at the turn. “That four-under could have been probably six or seven but it was a really good way to start,” Rory would say afterward.
A birdie at the par five second got him to five-under through 11. He’d stay there until he got a little careless at the fourth and fifth holes, two long par fours, the fifth is the most difficult on the 7,500 yard course. “I made a couple of sloppy swings,” McIlroy said of his approaches to both holes. At four he caught his second a little high on the club face and it came up short. He chipped aggressively, eight feet past the hole and missed the par putt.
At five, a second straight hole measuring more than 500 yards, he made his worst iron swing of the day. Came up short left from the middle of the fairway, just over 150 yards out. He would fail to get it up-and-down and found himself with back-to-back bogeys.
There was an immediate bounce-back at the 190-yard par three sixth where he stuck it in there three feet. At eight he made a masterful birdie from the woods off the tee. Final product was a 67, five-under and just a shot back of co-leaders Keith Horne and Trevor Fisher Jr.
“Yeah, it was good,” was how McIlroy appraised his day. “The first competitive round of 2017. I’m quite pleased.”
If you go back to last week to opening day at Kapalua, he was better than Jason Day, better than Dustin Johnson, better than Jordan Spieth. And Rory played a more challenging course with tree trouble everywhere at Glendower.
He equipment in the bag performed. McIlroy was launching long, accurate drivers for the most part with the Callaway Epic. He hit a lot of good irons shots — he birdied three of the four par threes, three of the four par fives.
Rory said he can go much lower and judging by his first day back on the job, it would be hard to argue with him.
The putter was decent, nothing to go bonkers over, but that is the one club that will probably determine the course of his season.
