He may have made some new swing changes, but he is still the same old Rory McIlroy.
The Northern Irishman carded an 8-under 64 on Sunday at the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship, soaring up the leaderboard to 21-under overall. He ultimately finished in a tie for third and three strokes behind Paul Waring, who birdied the 17th and 18th holes to pull away late.
His third-place finish also awarded him 465.33 Race to Dubai points, further cementing his spot atop the rankings going into next week’s DP World Tour Championship. McIlroy now has 4,997.66 points overall, and South African Thirston Lawrence, who is in second, has 3,212.64 on the season. But since the winner of next week’s event in Dubai wins 2,000 points, McIlroy would have to finish close to last not to win his sixth Order of Merit. Lawrence would also have to win outright, as he currently faces a deficit of 1785.02 points. Nobody other than Lawrence can steal McIlroy’s thunder since everyone else is more than 2,000 points behind McIlroy.
“Every shot counts at this moment in time, and I was glad to make the four at the last and at least give myself half a chance at this tournament this week but also give myself a little bit more of a cushion going into Dubai next week as well,” McIlroy said.
“I do feel in a good position. I saw Thriston [Lawrence] making a charge today, and I was keeping one eye on the leaderboard and looking at what he was doing. I saw he posted 20.”
Like McIlroy, Lawrence fired an 8-under 64 to finish in a tie for sixth with Tommy Fleetwood and a pair of Frenchmen, Ugo Coussad and Antonie Raznor.
“Just points-wise, I’m just looking at the leaderboard,” Lawrence said.
“I knew that was crucial just to get a top five or top six, at least, just depending on how the guys finished.”
Unfortunately for the South African, McIlroy bested him by a stroke, which increased his Race to Dubai lead by more than 200 points. So unless something crazy happens next week in Dubai, McIlroy will take home the Harry Vardon Trophy again.
Jack Milko is a golf staff writer for SB Nation’s Playing Through. Be sure to check out @_PlayingThrough for more golf coverage. You can follow him on Twitter @jack_milko as well.
