The hidden Masters advantage Rory McIlroy used to crack Augusta code

Rory McIlroy is presented with his second green jacket after joining Tiger Woods, Sir Nick Faldo and Jack Nicklaus as the only men to the tournament back-to-back (AP)

In the end, this second Masters championship for Rory McIlroy is almost unavoidably going to become a milestone.

If last year’s emotional triumph to complete the Grand Slam was a destination - the destination – then retaining it puts him in rarefied air but doesn’t answer the only question which will ultimately matter when all is said and done; where this child prodigy from Northern Ireland turned golfing superstar will rank among the all-time greats.

That is the competition for him now: how many majors he can amass, how many records he can break.

By his own admission on this Sunday night in Georgia, at American golf’s most famous course in its crown jewel competition, he won’t always have this level of preparation for a major.

But it was his preparation that ultimately proved crucial in holding off a late charge from some of the world’s best.

After 71 holes of rollercoaster golf, the 18th hole on Sunday was a microcosm of it all.

Needing to avoid a double-bogey on the last to win back-to-back Masters championships, McIlroy was once again wayward when the fairway was wide open for him.

“Coming off the 18th tee not knowing where my ball was, that was probably the moment of most stress; thinking this could be anywhere.”

Not for the first time, McIlroy’s driving put him out of position heading down the 18th with a two-shot lead (AP)

The Ulsterman had been long but inaccurate off the tee all week, and found the pine straw yet again. An iron to salvage things ended up in the bunker, but he splashed out to give himself a par putt that would have won the Masters. Drifting only a matter of inches past the hole, a bogey was still enough.

On Tuesday, McIlroy had commented that he felt “winning a Masters makes it easier to win your second one.”

But last year’s triumph might not have helped in the way you’d expect, and it turns out that there are far greater advantages to winning the Masters than people might realise.

The obvious one of McIlroy no longer feeling that same internal pressure to complete the Grand Slam is something that is undeniable, and he admitted himself that he felt it might be simpler this year without the weight of the Grand Slam on his shoulders. But all those years of neurotically wondering how to best prepare in order to give himself the best chance of winning have also set him up for future success at Augusta that will extend far beyond this year’s triumph, his second in a row.

McIlroy with his family after winning a second Masters, including parents Rosie and Gerry McIlroy - who would not miss a second green jacket (REUTERS)

McIlroy tried a lot of different regimes as he looked to climb the mountain – arriving late, arriving early, practicing a lot, not practicing at all, playing in tournaments, skipping them – but this year’s preparation is almost certainly what he will continue for the rest of time.

From his base in Florida, he has been baking practice at Augusta into his weekly routine to the extent that it now “feels like my home course”. Skipping the three tour events running up to the Masters simply because he “doesn’t like them” will have made a couple of PGA Tour tournament directors wince, but it has allowed him time to effectively commute (via private jet, naturally) and practice around the course where a tournament that will actually matter to his legacy is taking place.

“I did a couple of days where I dropped Poppy to school, flew up here, played, landed back home and had dinner with her – or had dinner with Erica probably… a couple of day trips like that where I felt it was a better use of my time than going to Houston or San Antonio,” McIlroy admitted in typically frank fashion.

“Monday, Tuesday last week, then Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. I was up here for a day the week before as well.

“I've been on this golf course so much the last three weeks, and that's been a combination of practice and chipping and putting around greens, and then just playing one ball and shooting scores and ending up in weird places that you maybe never find yourself and just trying to figure it out.”

McIlroy’s preparation for this year’s Masters is almost certainly what he will continue for the rest of time (REUTERS)

McIlroy revealed that it wasn’t about conserving energy, just spending productive time working on those details around on the greens where a major championship would be decided come this glorious mid-April Sunday.

And that level of practice has shown.

Ultimately what McIlroy has learned over his nearly two decades of playing years of playing here is that you need to be a killer with the wedges and putter in hand.

After two days, McIlroy was second-best putting and second-best driving distance but 90th in driving accuracy. He missed every single fairway on the par 5s as he built up his six-stroke lead over Thursday and Friday’s rounds, all eight of them, but came away with seven birdies and a par.

That’s a guy who understands how to play the course.

“I feel like being up here a lot and I've prepared as well for this Masters as any other that I've played,” he said.

Indeed, his 3.1 strokes gained around the greens during Friday’s round was not just the best in the field all weekend, it was the best by miles. In fact, the gap from first to second was the same as the gap from second to 45th. His chipping and short game was on a different planet to everyone else unfortunate enough to be trying to catch him at Augusta this weekend.

McIlroy was required to escape from the bunker on the 18th in order to avoid a double bogey (Getty Images)

“My scrambling, my putting and my short game are what won me this tournament,” he would say on Sunday night, that green jacket once again on his back.

While Saturday’s round had made the retrieval of that jacket more difficult, McIlroy leaned into practice as a means of dragging himself to the finish line.

After missing some key iron shots left on day three during a disappointing 73, his post-round trip to the driving range as the shadows disappeared and turned into night on Saturday was all about rediscovering the light fade and re-establishing control.

In McIlroy’s own words, the most important shot of Masters Sunday was his nine-iron off the tee on 12, where he pulled out that baby cut that he’d rehearsed so many times under the lights of the practice area and nailed it under the brightest lights of them all.

McIlroy highlighted his nine-iron off the tee on 12, which led to birdie, as his most important shot of the week (Getty Images)

“It was a really good golf shot at the right time, and probably a golf shot I wouldn’t have been able to hit yesterday before going to the range.”

That birdie, then another on 13, proved decisive. It was his golf through Amen Corner on Sunday and the resultant three-shot swing that was the difference between him and perennial contender Justin Rose, at one point a Sunday leader by two shots, and set McIlroy back on the path to glory after a wobbly start.

McIlroy described himself on Friday as a “wily old veteran” and this victory provided some support for that. No longer is he the boy wonder who dreams of emulating the greats, he is the established hero who inspires those following around the world.

Could other players have turned up at Augusta over the last few weeks and played practice rounds to familiarise themselves with the angles and sightlines provided by this sternest of tests? Probably not. That’s the benefit of a green jacket. Besides, most of them will have had tournaments to play.

Make no mistake, though. McIlroy has earned the right to prepare how he wishes, he had toiled for more than a decade without tasting glory and tried every which way to prepare in order to win. Now that he’s found his formula, and it appears he truly has, good luck convincing him to change it.

McIlroy and caddie Harry Diamond have cracked the code to win the Masters (Getty Images)

“I thought it was so difficult last year because I was trying to win the Masters and the Grand Slam but it turned it was just really difficult to win the Masters,” he laughed on a Sunday night that will once again be filled with champagne at the impeccable Augusta National clubhouse.

Yet he followed with a more important lesson, and a more pertinent one, as his smile melted into sincerity.

“If you put the hours in and you work on the right things, it’ll work out for you.”