Pebble Beach, California ….

It should come as a surprise Rory McIlroy is electing not to contest next month’s ultra-lucrative WGC – Mexico Championship in Mexico City.

McIlroy indicated on the eve of the AT & T Pebble Beach Pro-Am he will contesting six events in the eight weeks leading-up to the April 5th commencing Masters.

Those events include this week’s $US 7.4m event to be followed by next week’s Genesis Open in L.A. before heading home to Florida for the Honda Classic and then a week off before adding the March 8th starting Valspar Championship to his schedule for a first time.

McIlroy then will contest a fifth in the States in teeing-up in the March 15th commencing Arnold Palmer Invitational and a sixth the week after in contesting the WGC – Dell Match-Play in Austin, Texas.

It will then be a week off and not competing in Houston before making his way to Augusta.

Rory McIlroy in the 2017 WGC – Mexico Championship

And he explained his reasons for not wishing to travel to Mexico and after finishing T7th a year ago.

“The reason I’m playing Tampa is because if I didn’t play Tampa I would have two weeks off in a that middle stretch there because I’m not going to Mexico and I don’t feel like I want two weeks off,” he said.

“One week at home is enough and I can get a lot of work done and get a little bit of rest after the three weeks that I’ve had and I’ll want to go again.”

But while McIlroy has ruled out the lure of the $US 10m WGC – Mexico Championship he has not ruled out returning to Mexico given the 2019 event will be scheduled after the Genesis Open and before the start of the ‘Florida Swing’.

“I think that’s definitely a better way to do it, to go L.A., Mexico Florida..” he said.

“To go L.A., Florida then back is, look, it is what it is, it’s not too big a deal. I guess I didn’t do L.A. last year or Honda, I just went straight to Mexico as my first one back.

“But, yeah, it makes sense. It makes sense to do it that way.”