It could be one of the more timely decisions in golf with Rory McIlroy to ‘officially’ begin working full-time with legendary English swing coach Pete Cowen as he looks to rediscover his Major winning form heading to the Masters.
The Masters is just 16 days away while it’s been just over 500-days since McIlroy last won.
It was friend, colleague and fellow AGW member Jamie Corrigan who set tongues wagging that McIlroy is now working with Cowen in an article appearing in the London Daily Telegraph.
And overnight ESPN has confirmed a text message from McIlroy’s agent, Sean O’Flaherty stating, “Pete is an addition to Rory’s performance team”.
Peter Cowen offering Rory McIlroy a short-game tip and this was some years back with JP still on McIlroy’s bag. (Photo – www.golfbytourmiss.com)
O’Flaherty said that Cowen was joining the team. He did not say Bannon was leaving. And I would be surprised if Bannon is leaving that McIlroy surely would not announce any seperation in this manner given Bannon’s been like a second father to Rory.
Nonetheless Cowen, and who turned 70 last January, could be the best man for that job having worked with some of the best in the game including Lee Westwood, Henrik Stenson, Graeme McDowell, Danny Willett, Thomas Bjorn, Matt Fitzpatrick and more recently Brooks Koepka.
Though Cowen has worked with McIlroy in the past as evident in this photograph above taken out in China.
Cowen is a former coach of the Irish men’s golf team that McIlroy was a member, while it was only a week ago McIlroy and Cowen were spotted together on the range following McIlroy’s shock opening score of 79 at the Players Championship.
Should Bannon call it quits it means the end of one of the greatest partnerships in golf.
Bannon, and now aged 62, was the professional at Bangor Golf Club, and previously at Holywood Golf Club, where he first began working with a curly-haired, freckle-faced McIlroy. He went to work full-time with McIlroy in October, 2012.
McIlroy did speak after missing the TPC Sawgrass cut that he was being troubled by swing issues: “Doing a little bit of speed training, started getting sucked into that stuff, swing got flat, long and too rotational,” said McIlroy.
“I added some speed and am hitting the ball longer, but what that did to my swing as a whole probably wasn’t a good thing, so I’m sort of fighting to get back out of that. That’s what I’m frustrated with.”
At the Arnold Palmer Invitational, McIlroy indicated when asked by this journalist if he felt it was time for a change but when pressed for specifics, he appeared to dismiss the notion of a wholesale coaching change.
COWEN – IN HIS OWN WORDS
“I’ve had five players win major championships while I was working with them: Darren Clarke, Louis Oosthuizen, Graeme McDowell, Danny Willett and Henrik Stenson.
“Some other very good players: Lee Westwood, Thomas Bjorn, Sergio Garcia and Charl Schwartzel [before he won the Masters] among them. And now, Thomas Pieters and Matthew Fitzpatrick. Over 200 tournament titles worldwide.
“I’m proud of that, but you might have noticed I keep a fairly low profile. It’s not about me. I had my shot at fame when I played professionally for 10 years during the 1970s. I had very middling success—I was a failure, really—and my time to be famous came and went.
“As a coach, it’s good to be part of something special. But let’s face it, it’s about the players.”
+ Thanks to Golf Digest
