JUSTIN ROSE INTERVIEW: I DON’T KNOW WHY I WAS PRAISED AFTER LOSING TO RORY MCILROY
“Heartwarming” is one word Justin Rose uses to describe the outpouring of goodwill that surged in his direction after his act of sportsmanship following the play-off defeat against Rory McIlroy at last month’s Masters. “Baffled” is another.
“I have had as many, if not more, messages than after Merion [when he won the US Open in 2013] or Rio [when he won Olympic gold in 2016] and the overwhelming sentiment was congratulations rather than commiserations,” he says.
“It is heartwarming, yeah, but, to be honest, I have been a bit baffled because I really didn’t feel I did anything special. I just gave a mate a hug on the 18th green and told him it was great to see how special it was for him and you know, just tried to sort of table my own disappointment. That’s all. Maybe there were some other bigger pictures at play.”
There certainly were. For one, Rose was able in those agonising moments, as he struggled to come to terms with a second brush with a Green Jacket in a sudden-death shoot-out, to understand what it meant to McIlroy. “How couldn’t I?” Rose says. “It’d been a storyline for a decade or more and I knew what it meant at large.”
Secondly, there was the stark contrast of a wonderfully positive image being cast upon an ever-negative backdrop that has hung like a shroud since the advent of LIV Golf three years ago. So many of Rose’s peers and his mates jumped ship for the Saudi billions, but he turned down an absurd offer to continue chasing his dreams.
“That was a primary factor and, hey, it’s almost paid off,” he says. “I’ve finished runner-up in the last two majors and would I have even been playing if I’d switched across? Who knows? I have no regrets.”
Then there was the Sunday itself. “I had 10 birdies in that final round and at least made Rory work for it. Maybe people appreciated me making it a fight and stopping what could have been a procession. And the fact I was the old-timer in that battle – viewers love that!”
In truth, there is a simpler reason. Rose is a good bloke. He is not perfect – his long-time caddie, Mark Fulcher, will testify to that after a bag-full of on-course rollockings – but it is hard to disagree with the chief sports writer in this newspaper who in the Augusta aftermath praised the 44-year-old for “radiating class”.
And everyone who remembers the manner in which, as a teenager, he dealt with that brutal sequence of 21 missed cuts that opened his professional career will be aware that this humility is innate. As is the realisation that he should always give back.
In recent years, he and wife Kate have formed and established the Rose Ladies Series – originally to offer the stranded female pros a stage on which to play during the pandemic – and he has also put in his own money to act as title sponsor and promoter of the Justin Rose Telegraph Junior Championship.
He likes to help and, even though it is only a small thing, at this week’s US PGA Championship his golf bag will be emblazoned with the Aldershot FC logo, in honour of Sunday’s victory at Wembley in the FA Trophy final.
That slot on his bag could go for thousands, but Rose merely shrugs. “It is not Wrexham, is it? But the Shots are a local club in Hampshire and it’ll be good to give them the publicity. And it’ll keep my manager [Paul McDonnell] happy. He’s a huge Shots fan.”
If karma is planning to drop in at Quail Hollow in the next few days then there could surely not be many more deserving candidates.
Despite his magnanimity being acclaimed the world over, he was low in the days following the Masters. “I wasn’t quite ready to go through all the messages straight away. I started to on the Monday and Tuesday, because I wanted to say thanks.
“But then I was like, ‘I need a bit of my own time here to process it’. I worked through it and reached the stage where I didn’t feel too despondent. I don’t really now see it as a loss on that Sunday, because I lost it on Saturday, when I turned a 69 into a 75.
“I think I played well enough to win. I mean, Rory played well enough to win a lot more comfortably than he did so everyone can say, ‘hey, I should’ve won, whatever’. But it’s like the level was there to win, which is important.”
As a major champion, a gold medallist, a former world No 1 and a Ryder Cup hero, Rose should have no requirement for validation. Yet he does, perhaps because of the number of LIV dollars he rejected, but more likely because of the exhaustive hours he puts in.
“I need to know I’m not deluding myself. I need to know that I can still do it and this quest for another big one, or two, whatever, is not a forlorn task. That’s crucial to me. Sometimes you don’t know when you’re right in the thick of it. But I have been close – there have been five second places in the majors since Merion.
“And I feel like I’ve been closer than ever of late and the record shows it. Xander [Schauffele] was impressive at Royal Troon, but I did have a real, real chance at the Open in July and then, well, the Masters…
“Look, in other circumstances, I could be going for my own career grand slam at the [US] PGA. It’s not a ridiculous notion, not a million miles off, and that’s powerful motivation and makes me continue to work hard and think of ways I can still compete.”
In this regard, Rose has taken a leaf out of the ageless book of Novak Djokovic. “We have a mutual friend and we have always spoken of Novak summing up longevity. He has stressed that recovery is everything and that’s why I commissioned and bought my “recovery vehicle” – my custom-built RV – when I turned 40.”
Rose invested in his body – insiders suggest to the tune of £200,000-plus – with this converted motorhome. It is the only one of its kind on Tour and follows him on his schedule. A driver traverses the United States, finding a berth at or near the courses.
“Sometimes we can park it on site, but we have had to rent people’s back gardens to accommodate it. At the Masters it was right across the street. As a team we have our morning meetings there – it does have a fantastic coffee machine – and it is a nice place to chill. But it is essentially for after the rounds.
“There’s everything in it. We’ve got red-light therapy, we have fresh oxygen – so a spin bike with fresh oxygen – we’ve hot and cold plungers, infrared sauna and steam shower. It does prolong the day, probably by an hour or more. But it is a good hour. It definitely helps.”
Augusta was the evidence. As the youngsters around him toiled in the glare, Rose came through the field, as he says, “like a whippet”.
“It was not just the physical stamina, but the mental stamina and the ability to expend that nervous energy. I had breakfast with Shane [Lowry] that morning and we were on the same score after three rounds. Shane said: ‘We are a bit back, but if Rory and Bryson [DeChambeau] get caught up in their own thing, one of us could easily come through’.
“I thought about that conversation afterwards. Shane, one of the in-form players in the world, struggled [shooting an 81] and I was the one to do it and at this stage of my career I’m proud of that. It tells me I might be doing all the right things.”
Quail Hollow presents Rose with a fresh opportunity. As the only over-40 in the world’s top 30, he is up to 16th in the rankings and is all but a certainty for an eighth Ryder Cup appearance. He is the only player to have finished in the top 15 of the last five US PGAs and, after recovering from a bug, is the outrageous price of 125-1.
“I always thought this would be the major I am most suited to and have been consistent. I finished third behind Rory way back. I’ve had some strong finishes at Quail Hollow, three top-fives. So yeah. There’s enough there for me to think it’s doable and for me to believe. And for me, right now, that’s all that really matters.”
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