As the final round of the Masters was about to start this past Sunday, I harkened back to 2011, when at the start of the final round, Rory McIlroy was 12 under par, just like he was this year. However, instead of this year’s two-stroke lead, he had a four-stroke lead at the start of Sunday’s play in 2011. After a pedestrian front nine, Rory stood on the tenth tee at -11, with three others, including Tiger Woods, within one stroke of the lead. As I watched the scoreboard from a chair near the 12th tee, the crowd gasped as Rory’s score changed from -11 to -8. We later learned that Rory pulled his tee shot on #10 among the cabins way left of the fairway, and by the time he holed out, he made a triple-bogey, which he followed with a bogey on #11 and a double-bogey on #12. A final bogey on #15 left him at -4 for the tournament and tied for 15th place. While that finish might have devastated many, Rory bounced back and won the US Open by eight strokes in his next major championship two months later.
In the intervening fourteen years, Rory has had a tremendous career, winning three more major championships (PGA Championship in 2012 and both the PGA and Open Championships in 2014), two Players Championships, three FedEx Cups. However, despite finishing in the top ten at the Masters seven out of nine years from 2014 to 2022, a Masters win to achieve the career Grand Slam (winning all four major championships) remained elusive. In addition, he had not won a major championship in more than ten years, including a devasting one-stroke loss in last year’s US Open in which he missed two very short putts in the last three holes. A couple of times in this year’s Masters, it looked like such heartbreak might continue.
In Thursday’s first round, after fourteen holes, Rory was four under par and near the top of the leaderboard. However, after double-bogeys on #15 and #17, Rory finished the round at even par, seven strokes behind leader Justin Rose. Despite such adversity, Rory roared back to shoot six under par both Friday and Saturday to take a two-stroke lead over Bryson DeChambeau, Rory’s nemesis from last year’s US Open, and it looked like a two-man battle entering the final round. However, as we all know by now, Rory’s Sunday was a roller coaster of emotions, giving up the lead with a double-bogey on the first hole, having gained control of the tournament until another double-bogey at #13, until finally winning in a playoff after making a bogey on #18 when a par would have won the tournament. What Rory showed following his devastating result in 2011, his traumatic US Open loss in 2024, his difficult finish in Thursday’s first round, and the ups and downs of Sunday’s final round was resilience that we all could and should emulate in our business lives. We can also look at the examples of other players in the field to show how we can use resilience to triumph over anxiety in all aspects of our lives.
Resilience is the ability to bounce back from adversity, and resilience was clearly exhibited by Rory McIlroy and others in the recently concluded Masters. Let’s take a look at how Rory and other golfers, such as Justin Rose and Scottie Scheffler, were resilient throughout the tournament and how we can apply what they did to our business and personal lives.
- Learning from Failure and Handling Setbacks: In both golf and business, failures and setbacks are inevitable. Sometimes, those failures and setbacks are of our own doing, and sometimes, they are caused by outside factors. In order to be resilient, we have to learn from our own mistakes and make the appropriate changes necessary to improve. In addition, we need to realize what is out of our control and do our best to deal with those things, knowing we cannot change them. After Rory’s failure at the Masters in 2011, he learned he was trying to be “too focused and too perfect,” which led to poor play under pressure. This led him to try to find a balance between aiming for perfection and maintaining a positive mindset when things did not go perfectly…A good lesson for all of us to learn.
- Maintaining a Positive Mindset: For both golfers and those in business to be successful, a positive mindset is essential. Maintaining confidence in your abilities is crucial. After Rory’s unforced error at the 13th hole on Sunday, his positivity on his second shot at the 15th led to a birdie, which was almost an eagle. Despite making a bogey on the 18th hole in regulation, he came back with a birdie on the same hole in the playoff. Boosted by his confidence in his abilities.
- Patience and Perseverance: Both Rose and Scheffler demonstrated patience and perseverance that kept them in contention. After a relatively poor third round, Justin Rose stuck with it on Sunday, eventually retaking the lead and ending up in the playoff. Scheffler clearly did not have his “A” game this week, and despite that, he ended up in fourth place, only three strokes out of playoff, by maintaining his patience and keeping at it with the game he did have. This should teach us that no matter how things are going, persevering and having the patience to wait for things to click will lead to success.
As is often the case, watching athletes playing at the highest levels provides us with lessons that we can use in business and other aspects of our lives. While this week’s Masters was exciting and entertaining, it also demonstrated how resiliency can help make you a winner!
