NORTON, Mass. – Rory McIlroy has spent the last few weeks watching his 16-year-old self and perfecting a swing adjustment that he hopes will catapult him to a second FedExCup triumph. The 2016 FedExCup champion sat out THE NORTHERN TRUST in the opening week of the FedExCup Playoffs and as a consequence dropped to 28th in the FedExCup standings. But the two-time Dell Technologies Championship winner feels it was time well spent as he is trying to return to the swing of his younger years, studying video of when he was just 16. The catalyst was a poor final round at the World Golf Championships – Bridgestone Invitational where he failed to put pressure on Justin Thomas in the final group (finished T6) and a relatively limp performance at the PGA Championship in St. Louis where he tied for 50th. “That was all to do with swing mechanics and technique,â€� McIlroy said of his recent form. “I just needed to have a couple of weeks off and sort of assess where I was at and what I needed to do to improve and go forward. “So I worked for ten days with Michael Bannon down in Florida. We worked on a few things, sort of looking back at old video all the way back to when I was 16 and what I’ve done well in my swing throughout the years. And just sort of trying to get back to that.â€� The Northern Irishman downplayed the changes a little, saying he wasn’t trying to reinvent the wheel. But none-the-less he felt it imperative to step away from competition to ingrain it in. The issue for McIlroy has been being too shallow on his takeaway and steep on his downswing. His younger self had the opposite – steep on the takeaway and shallow on the way down. “That’s why I get two-way misses left and right,â€� McIlroy says. “It was a good thing for me because I’ve been sort of fighting with Michael on this for a while. So it made me realize, OK, I can do this again. And even just watching it you start to feel the feelings that you might need to get back into those positions. So it was a beneficial week.â€� The 14-time PGA TOUR winner who claimed the Arnold Palmer Invitational presented by Mastercard earlier this season now feels fresh and more importantly confident with the tweaks as he looks to go on his Playoff blitz. On two separate occasions McIlroy has won multiple Playoff events in one season (2014, 2016). On both of those occasions TPC Boston was one of the happy hunting grounds. “It’s good to be back. I’ve had some really good memories here in Boston, two good wins that have set me up for a win at the FedExCup, which I was able to win in ’16,â€� he said. “It’s a good test. If you play well, you can make a lot of birdies and you can get on runs. I feel like I’ve played well here because of that, the par-5s, the short par-4s, the bentgrass greens, I seem to putt better on those. So I’m excited to get back. “I’m actually pleasantly surprised I didn’t drop more in the FedExCup, I thought from 21 I was going to drop outside the top-30. But I was able to hold my position pretty well. I feel like I’m in a decent position coming into this week.â€�
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