Rory McIlroy won the Players Championship. Although he could have finished work earlier in the day, Rory played in the playoffs, beating J.J. Spaun, building a great foundations before this year’s Masters. Rory won his 28th PGA Tour title, but that’s a number he absolutely does not want to stop at.
The Northern Irish golfer admitted that for a long time he had not felt such nervousness as before the playoff. However, Rory managed to keep a cool head and secure the victory.
McIlroy is an experienced golfer who has been in similar situations many times before, but does this great golfer have tactics to deal with pressure and nervousness?
“People say pressure is a privilege, and it really is. You want to feel like that on the course,” McIlroy said, as quoted by Golf Digest.
“That’s why I spend the time that I do practicing and trying to master my craft, that you get yourself in those positions to see what you’re made of.”
The effect of positive thoughts
Being a golfer often means finding yourself in difficult, sometimes even impossible, situations. Rory is aware of this. However, before each shot, an experienced golfer visualizes and focuses on bringing positive thoughts to his mind in order to achieve success. Rory admitted that he has practiced this many times and has improved in this aspect.
“Walking from the 16th green to the 17th tee today, I could see myself hitting it in the water, right? That’s something that crosses your mind, and it’s like, OK, how do I replace that thought with a better one and visualize and get myself into the moment?” McIlroy said.
“I’ve practiced hard at that, and definitely getting better at it.”
Rory McIlroy explains that it is crucial that we strive to make positive thoughts stronger and more powerful than negative ones. He stressed that we all have negative thoughts, but what matters is how we deal with them, how we reframe them and replace them with what we want to see and achieve.
Tennis World USA