Rory McIlroy spent last week poking holes in his game as Masters looms
Rory McIlroy will play the Texas Children's Houston Open for the first time since 2014. Pic: Jonathan Bachman/Getty Images)
Rory McIlroy was delighted to win The Players Championship for the second time earlier this month but the world number two still feels his performance could have been better at Sawgrass.
He will play the Texas Children's Houston Open this week for the first time since 2014, believing the Memorial Park course suits his game. The tournament moving to two weeks before the Masters rather than one also works better with his schedule.
"It was great to get a win a couple weeks ago but I still feel I could have played a lot better," said McIlroy.
"I tried to poke holes in a lot of my game last week and think about things I could do better, and there were definitely things that I could work on or do better. It's a good opportunity to go out and see if some of the work I did at home and I'm continuing to do here, hopefully it's all going in the right direction."
McIlroy visited Augusta last week for a refresher as he aims to win the tournament for the first time, a victory which would also be his first Major title since 2014.
"I use those trips just to refamiliarise myself with the place, clubs off tees, looking to see if they changed any greens," he said.
"There's four greens that are new this year that they've redone. You have a look at those and see if there's any new hole positions they give you..
"It's nice to play a practice round without people around and it sort of takes the pressure off the start of the week for me. There's a lot of obligations, there's big commitments whether it be from media or the par-3 tournament on Wednesday.
"I just like to get up there and feel like I'm not rushed Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday the week of the tournament and that's usually the reason I go there."
The 35-year-old will make his film debut in Happy Gilmore 2 later this year. The original, released in 1996, was one of his favourites growing up.
"It was amazing," McIlroy said about being involved in the film.
"I spent two weeks up there. I spent spent a lot of time with Scottie (Scheffler) and Brooks (Kopeka) and Bryson (DeChambeau), sort of the four of us that were up there and filming a lot of the same scenes.
"To be acting alongside - well, 'acting', I don't know if you could call it acting, we'll wait and see - with (Adam) Sandler and all the rest of the cast, it was an unbelievable experience. I certainly do not have a future in movies or acting, but it was an amazing experience."
