Rory McIlroy kissed his wife Erica Stoll at the Masters after their marriage landed in the rough last year. The couple were all smiles after their difficulties when the world’s number two golfer, 35, filed for divorce last May but called it off a month later.
As McIlroy seeks his first victory at Augusta, they teamed up at the annual Par 3 contest, with American Erica, 37, dressed in a white Masters caddie suit. The Northern Irishman was also seen wearing his wedding ring as he prepared for the first major of the year.
McIlroy is among the favourites after winning last month’s Players Championship, when he celebrated alongside his young family. And there were more cheers when the couple’s daughter Poppy, four, holed a massive 25ft putt on the tricky greens at Augusta National, Georgia.
But while McIlroy, golfer Shane Lowry and fans around the ninth green celebrated the putt as though she had won the Green Jacket, Poppy just wanted a hug from her dad. Ahead of the Masters, which teed off yesterday, McIlroy discussed the importance of his family as they support him in his bid for the elusive major and golf’s Grand Slam.
Speaking of Poppy, he said: “Yeah, it definitely makes the lows a little easier to take. The highs are going to be high but it’s amazing – I think after the Players, it was the first time she sort of realised what I did, which was really cool. Also a little scary at the same time.”
McIlroy continued: “It’s amazing that I can share these things with her and with Erica and, the day after The Players, she went into school and there was a couple of kids that had said some stuff to her, and she came home to me that day and said, ‘Daddy, are you famous?’
“I said, ‘It depends who you talk to!’ It’s a bit of a double-edged sword. You have to temper the expectations sometimes. As everyone knows that’s had children, it’s an amazing addition to life, and it’s great that she’s here this week.”
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It could be the greatest week of his career, as victory at the Masters would see McIlroy join Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player, Ben Hogan, Gene Sarezen and Tiger Woods in having won all four major titles. Nicklaus recently had lunch with McIlroy and backed his shot-by-shot plan to finally conquer Augusta National.
“i think it’s about time that Rory won and I sat down with him last week,” Nicklaus revealed. “I said, ‘I know you prepared for Augusta, tell me how you’re going to play the golf course’. We went through it shot for shot, we got done with the round, I didn’t open my mouth and I said, ‘I wouldn’t change a thing’.
“That’s exactly the way I would try to play the golf course. The discipline to do that is what Rory has lacked in my opinion. He’s got all the shots, he’s got all the game.
“He certainly is as talented as anybody in the game, but if you go back through his history in the last few years he gets to a place and all of a sudden a seven or an eight pops up and that keeps him from getting where he needs to go.”
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