As Rory McIlroy tries to end the great drought, Holywood waits and hopes

“I think the guy who invented cat eyes on the road was from Holywood,” said Rory McIlroy.

The good boy went from there to superstardom and to Florida without distancing himself from this Belfast suburb of about 11,000 people, or from the Holywood Golf Club where he germinated and where a car park bearing his name still cries prudishly. That in turn has led those who loved him first on a remarkable 14-year run, a golfing trajectory strange enough to be judged complex.

For as many as four out of fifteen In major tournaments held between June 2011 and August 2014, they reveled in his victories, as his great swing and strong head caused otherwise sane pundits to begin guessing at his career totals, as if there were more than one Tiger Woods. And then, for the 37 majors since then, from McIlroy’s 25th to 35th year, the crowds at the club’s bars have thinned at key moments as the city that speaks so fondly of him has turned his long wait for a fifth into his long wait for a fifth.

That wait has joined the most compelling primer yet on the difficulty of winning golf majors, an elusiveness so outrageous that it seems almost miraculous that anyone wins them at all. As McIlroy has missed cuts or failed to threaten or come close at St Andrews in 2022, Los Angeles in 2023 or, most painfully, Pinehurst last month, it has made a bit of poetry out of Holywood Golf Club chairman Stephen Tullin:

“Everyone has had their ups and downs with it,” he said when given another chance this week across the North Channel and the Firth of Clyde in Troon, Scotland, at the British Open.

Holywood does exist, it turns out. Board the punctual train from Belfast city centre and head north-east for three stops: Titanic Quarter (where the Titanic was built), then Sydenham (where you’ll get off in front of George Best Belfast City Airport, named after the late, great, swashbuckling footballer). Drive past Harland & Wolff skyline cranes, the obligatory Ikea, purple flowers and electricity pylons, and listen for the correct pronunciation of “Holywood” (like “Hollywood”) on the announcements.

Holywood, where people walk friendly dogs named Winston (after a certain two-time British prime minister) along the pretty waterfront, is right on a lake (inlet) beautiful enough to seem a certain champion of lakes. Its position on the 54th parallel means lush light in summer, and the silence on weekday evenings seems quieter than just quiet. En route to Holywood Golf Club, you’ll pass Sullivan Upper School with its greener-than-green playing fields, where McIlroy went, and reach the course with two women playing in the copious light of 8:30pm, one teeing off and the other saying, “Ohhhh, that’s beautiful.”

From the large, modern clubhouse of a 120-year-old club, with its pro shop selling “Home of Rory McIlroy” towels, you can see all the way down to the town and the lake, perhaps even a tugboat creeping slowly past on the water while an Aer Lingus buzzes overhead. Up here, three generations of McIlroys have played well and built goodwill: grandfather Jimmy, who played a great short game and died shortly after retiring from Harland & Wolff, father Gerry and his generation, and then Rory, who at the age of 18 said long ago at Carnoustie: “I’ve been a member there since I was 7. My father has been a member all his life (and worked behind the bar). Everybody knows everybody.”

There’s a room full of replica trophies from his majors, Ryder Cup golf bags and photos of his development since he started carrying around a golf bag that seemed bigger than him.

Plaques of club and matchplay champions hang in the lobby. They include Rory McIlroy who won the club in 2005 at the age of 15, Gerry McIlroy who won the club in 1993 and the matchplay five times, and Rory’s uncle Colm who won the club in 1990.

After Michael Eaton completes an evening round, this club member since 1973 and worthy ambassador describes Rory McIlroy’s two-part journey through the feared, coveted majors.

First of all, it’s amazing that anyone, anywhere, would dare to win four.

“I never thought that a little boy from Holywood, where I was born, his parents live there (in the city) and his grandparents are from there, that we would have a great champion here,” he said. “You know, it’s very rare that you get to experience that — very, very rare. So you know, I remember all the (British) Opens and all the greats from the early ’70s, so to have someone here who has actually won that claret jug, a great champion, and is only one Masters away from winning the Grand Slam, only six players have ever done that, it’s just amazing.”

And then there is the second part, the long search for number 5.

“I think if he can just — if he can win another major, he’ll win three, four, five more,” Eaton said. “It’s just winning this first time again. You know what? It’s so funny. Look at how you would have lost a fortune to Tiger Woods, when was it, 2008, when it took him 11 years to win a major when he won the Masters five years ago. Nobody ever thought that.”

Expectations rose and then reality hit hard, all for a player with 40 pro and 26 PGA Tour victories who, Eaton said, “there’s no doubt in anyone’s mind sometimes that he’s the best player in the world, the way he hits it, the way he can string rounds together. Obviously he makes mistakes, but you look at the whole picture and think, ‘Why isn’t he winning?’ But we always lose sight of the fact that he’s still winning a lot of tournaments.”

Of course, there’s sometimes a little less verve on the big weekends, compared to June 2011, when the place was buzzing as he won the U.S. Open title at Congressional, or the 2012 PGA Championship at Kiawah in South Carolina, or the 2014 British Open in Liverpool and the PGA at Valhalla in Louisville. As Eaton put it, he never imagined he’d have to wait this long.

Meanwhile, the tourists are still coming: “Americans, Chinese, Japanese, Germans, Swiss, Canadians,” Tullin said. And 21-year-old pro Tom McKibbin, who grew up playing at Holywood Golf Club, is already thriving on tour, and the generation just behind him is blossoming, having grown up on McIlroy’s presentation of the possible: “Certainly, all the young kids at the club in particular are very excited about (McIlroy). Rory has got them all playing golf.” And so: “We have, quite frankly, probably the best youth program in Ireland. We have so many really good (young) golfers. … We have young guys who are 15, 16 at the moment and playing handicap 4, 5.”

If you can feel a big Sunday in Holywood, it’s the youngsters who make you feel it the most. Their eyes are now on Troon.

“How long is the piece of rope?” Tullin describes McIlroy’s wait. “You just don’t know. … A lot of us believe it’s going to happen soon, if he gets another one, and we’re really looking forward to the week in Troon. We’ve got a good feeling about it.”