Rory McIlroy jokes about big equipment switch in India: "Probably asleep in the locker"
Masters champion and Ryder Cup hero Rory McIlroy elected not to use one of the most important clubs in his bag during the first round of this week's DP World India Championship.
Rory McIlroy joked his driver was asleep in the locker after the Northern Irishman elected not to use the big stick at this week's DP World India Championship.
McIlroy, 36, kicked off the inaugural $4m DP World Tour event at Delhi Golf Club with a solid score of 3-under 69.
But he was without his trusty TaylorMade Qi10. In its place, McIlroy has decided to use a 5-wood, plus he'll be hitting plenty of long irons off the tee.
The Delhi track has little room for error and McIlroy visited the woods once during his opening round.
He said in his pre-tournament news conference that the next time he imagined hitting driver would be at next month's Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship.
"Dog was out of the bag, probably asleep in the locker," McIlroy told Sky Sports after putting the finishing touches on his opening round.
Asked to explain the decision, McIlroy said: "I was sort of thinking about it last night before I went to bed.
"Sometimes if you're really conservative off a par-5 today, you might have like a 5-wood into the green, but I'm never going to hit driver.
"So I just thought I've got to 2-iron, 3-iron, 4-iron all the way through, and then I've got a 5-wood just in case I need to hit it for an approach shot on a par-5.
"But I just don't see any hole out there that I hit to hit it more than say 260, 270 off the tee."
Rory McIlroy explains why he chose to leave his driver out of the bag for the first round of the DP World india Championship pic.twitter.com/XkMdoD34Cs
— Sky Sports Golf (@SkySportsGolf) October 16, 2025
McIlroy said he was a tad surprised with some of the pin locations.
He plans to be even more conservative as the week progresses.
"It's pretty tricky," he said. "You're just really trying to be as conservative as possible off the tee and then trying to pick off birdies on the par-fives and maybe pick up a couple more.
"Yeah, it's a tricky golf course. I thought some of the hole locations early on were really tricky. You play a practice round or a pro-am, the pins are all in the middle of the green.
"Then you get to tournament day and they start to tuck them away a little bit, and of course definitely played a little tougher than I expected it to today."
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