Andy DevaneyShane Lowry arrives at the BMW PGA Championship with the best possible problem: extraordinary form, a week he has barely processed and an urgent need for some sleep.
There are more conventional ways to prepare for the BMW PGA Championship than winning your national open by 11 shots, arriving at Adare at 1 am, getting up again at 7 am to play 18 holes, squeezing in a visit home and then heading for Wentworth.
Shane Lowry, though, has not had much time for conventional.
Four days after turning the Irish Open into a procession, the immediate challenge at Wentworth is not finding his golf. That part appears to be in decent order. It is finding enough physical and mental space to go through the whole competitive exercise again.
“Not really, to be honest. It’s been a mad few days,” Lowry said when asked whether he had managed to reflect on what he had just done.
That might be the most understandable answer he gives all week.
An 11-shot win takes some processing
Lowry did not sneak away with the Irish Open. He started the final round four ahead, shot a seven-under 63, finished at 23 under and beat Patrick Reed and Joaquin Niemann by 11. The winning margin was the largest in Irish Open history.
There were long putts, plenty of birdies and very little encouragement for anybody hoping Sunday might become competitive.
Lowry, understandably, is still trying to absorb it.
“To win my National Open by 11 shots was incredible to do it the way I did, everything about the whole week, the crowds, the after there, it was an amazing week.”
There is another part of that sentence which matters now. Lowry acknowledged that he has been through “a few little tough times” this year. Suddenly, he has moved from dealing with those frustrations to dealing with the aftermath of one of the most emphatic victories of his career.
Professional golf does not allow much time for either.
Wentworth was already waiting.
Winning by 11 does not buy a week off
Lowry’s problem is a pleasant one, but it is still a problem.
He has arrived at one of the biggest weeks on the schedule carrying the emotional high of the Irish Open and the accumulated fatigue of everything that followed it. Resetting after disappointment is one skill. Resetting after winning by double figures, with all the celebration and attention that comes with it, is another.
“I don’t know, to be honest. I’ve been pretty busy since I finished on Sunday and I’ve got this afternoon now to sort of chill and try to get my head around back to competing tomorrow because at the end of the day, I’m a professional and I’m a golfer and I want to go out there and do my best.”
The solution, as Lowry sees it, is refreshingly unscientific.
Rest.
“Rest is going to be important over the next few days and if I can play golf the way I am, hopefully give myself a chance this week, as well.”
There is little point searching for a swing thought when the swing has just delivered an 11-shot victory. The greater danger is arriving at the first tee mentally somewhere between last Sunday and the next hotel pillow.
Adare offered little chance to put his feet up
The schedule immediately after the Irish Open hardly resembled recovery.
Lowry headed to Adare, arriving at 1am before getting up at 7am and playing 18 holes as part of a gathering that also gave potential Ryder Cup players a taste of that environment.
He admitted he was tired on the course but still considered the journey worthwhile.
“It was really nice, I was very tired on the course, and we had a good time. It was a worthwhile trip for the team, and I’m sure Luke and Dodo got some good stuff out of it.”
For the prospective Ryder Cup players involved, Lowry could also see the value of simply being around golfers who have lived through those weeks before.
“It might give them something extra that they need to kick on now and go ahead to make the team.”
For Lowry himself, the more important stop may have come afterwards.
He got home to see his parents and those closest to him in Offaly on Monday evening. After a year containing enough difficult Mondays, he was happy to experience a rather different one.
It was not exactly a prolonged celebration. Perhaps that suited him.
Wentworth is a good place to keep moving
If Lowry had been asked to choose somewhere to return to work, Wentworth would rank fairly highly.
“This is my favourite tournament of the year,” he said.
That is quite a statement from a player who had just spent the previous week winning the Irish Open, but Lowry’s relationship with the BMW PGA runs deep. He has won here before, enjoys the area and clearly regards the tournament as something more significant than another stop on the calendar.
“Love coming over here. Just love being here, the whole area. We get looked after so well. I think this is obviously our biggest tournament of the year, and the Tour do a great job in the tournament they put on here.”
The course has made a similarly good first impression.
Lowry described the greens as “as pure and healthy as I’ve ever seen them”, particularly after a warm summer, and expects the atmosphere around Wentworth to deliver again.
All of which should make returning to tournament mode slightly easier.
Lowry does not sound interested in a victory lap
The temptation after a home win of that scale would be to spend the next few days enjoying the view.
Lowry does not appear particularly interested.
There is fatigue in his answers, certainly. There is also satisfaction. But there is no suggestion that Wentworth has arrived inconveniently or that the job is temporarily finished.
The useful thing about winning by 11 is that there is not much mystery surrounding the state of your golf.
Lowry knows he can score. He knows the game that demolished the Irish Open field has travelled with him to England. His task over the next few days is therefore less about rebuilding anything than making sure the player arrives on the first tee as fresh as the golf.
After the madness of the previous few days, even Lowry seems unsure how quickly that process can happen.
He does know what comes next.
“I’m a professional and I’m a golfer and I want to go out there and do my best.”
At Wentworth, the celebrations are over. The golf, inconveniently for everybody else, may not be.
