DERMOT GILLEECE
On the morning after his Masters debut
in 2005, Graeme McDowell and his parents
were preparing to go their separate ways.
While Kenny and Marian headed for Char-
lotte (North Carolina) to catch a plane en
route to their home in Portrush, Northern
Ireland, their son was driving southeast to
the Verizon Heritage at Harbour Town.
It was a bittersweet moment which
prompted Marian, in the way of caring
mothers, to wipe tears from her eyes.
“That’s when I told them it was the first
of many weeks they would have, coming
to watch me play on the big stage,” said
the 25-year-old with the quiet assurance
of someone who knew precisely where he
was going. “I want them to be part of what
I’m doing, but on their own terms.”
Five years on, while Kenny stood on
the 18th green of Pebble Beach on U.S.
Open Sunday, listening to his son make an
acceptance speech as the newly crowned
champion, Marian called him on his cell
phone. She was in Spain on holiday and
sobbed with boundless joy at her son’s
achievement.
And there were more tears in Portrush
Wednesday, when the McDowell fam-
ily shared an extraordinary homecoming.
Kenny and Graeme had arrived from the
U.S. via London, and Marian was home
from Spain, while younger son Gary, a
scratch amateur, hadn’t far to travel as a
member of the greenkeeping staff at
Royal Portrush.
It was arguably the proudest day in the
63-year history of Rathmore Golf Club,
which Kenny humorously refers to as “the
working-man’s version of Royal Portrush.”
Constitutionally, it is limited to 155 mem-
bers who can play both the Valley and
Dunluce courses by arrangement with their
landlords. And local hero, Fred Daly, win-
ner of the 1947 Open Championship, was a
one-time captain there.
Drinks on the house has become
something of a Rathmore ritual after
McDowell’s tournament wins. “This round
looks like being seriously expensive,” said
McDowell with a broad grin, surveying the
hundreds of well-wishers. “But it’s the
least I can do. This is where it all began for
me – a long journey which culminated at
Pebble.”
Monday morning, in a plush hotel
on Cannery Row near Pebble, McDow-
ell walked around the lobby, clinging to
the U.S. Open trophy. Passers-by looked
bemused. Some were bold enough to have
their photograph taken with the new cham-
pion who, in a U.S. Open T-shirt, shorts
and flip-flops, was dressed
almost exactly as Padraig
Harrington was on
the morning
after his PGA
triumph at
Oakland Hills in
August 2008.
and son in such circumstances brought
to mind some remarkable milestones in
McDowell’s golfing journey. I remembered
June 2001, when he departed Ljunghusens
outside Malmo, Sweden, as Ireland’s best
player in the European Amateur Team
Championship. Less than 14 months later,
on a return visit, he achieved his break-
through victory on the European Tour, in
the Scandinavian Masters in Stockholm.
In between, there was unprecedented
success on the U.S. college circuit as a
scholarship student at the University of
Alabama-Birmingham, setting standards
which eclipsed the previous efforts of none
other than Tiger Woods. Prior to that, he
had left his stamp on his home scene as
Close and South of Ireland champion at
either end of the country in Millennium
Year, one at Royal Portrush and the other
at Lahinch.
And it all started so modestly. At £ 1
(sterling) a round, Kenny had visions of
being doomed to penury in his attempts at
finding a pitch-and-putt outlet for his two
young sons. Then Dai Stevenson, the
Portrush professional, offered
him a deal: at a fee of £ 10,
they could play The Himala-
yas for the season.
“When Graeme and
Gary played 33
rounds in the first
week, I consid-
ered it money
well spent,” chuckled the proud father,
who earned a modest wage as a technician
in the local Coleraine Institute and Marian
managed a department store. Graeme was
then 9 and The Himalayas was the charm-
ing little nine-hole, pitch-and-putt course
attached to Royal Portrush where, inciden-
tally, he joined an elite group of honorary
life members in 2003.
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