What it was like to play Augusta National after Rory McIlroy won

It began as a coping mechanism.

A way to remind yourself that, sure, while the result wasn’t what you were after, it could have been worse.

And just like that, standing on the back of the green at hole number one at Augusta National Golf Club, contemplating a three putt right out of the gates, is how I came to be going head-to-head with the newest member of the Career Grand Slam Society.

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It’s 9am Monday, the day after the most exhausting, draining, captivating and ultimately exultant Masters final round we’re likely to see for a long, long time.

15 minutes earlier I stood on the first tee on the most picture perfect morning you could ever imagine, scarcely able to believe that I’d been invited to play the golf course matched only in fame by a little layout you may have heard of by the name of the Old Course at St Andrews.

It was an opportunity that was completely unexpected, tremendously humbling and absolutely wonderful to receive.

Now, anybody can play the Old Course. It’s completely open to the public and requires no secret handshakes or connections to titans of industry.

Augusta National Golf Club, on the other hand, is slightly different, to the point that you’re much more likely to be invited to play point guard for the Golden State Warriors in the NBA Finals than tee it up at the venue where each April somebody adds a green jacket to their walk-in wardrobe.

The chance of a lifetime. Source: Supplied

So, when you’re handed a blank envelope that measures 15 x 11 centimetres containing an invitation to play Augusta National, firing at the same pins the world’s best were shooting at the day before, your mind is swimming like it rarely ever has.

Your dreams have been made real and for a moment you’re rendered without speech, but when the ability to talk returns and you’ve said thank you several hundred times, your emotions settle with the thought that perhaps only other golfers can relate to - ‘what if I stink it up?’.

It can be like that with people who have chosen this glorious but infuriating game as their pastime, and I’m sure it’s there in the subconscious of major winners and weekend hackers alike - the thought that while you love this game, you just don’t want to embarrass yourself whether you’re playing in front of three mates who couldn’t care less if you shoot a thousand, or 50 million television viewers watching around the globe.

We’re quick to search for a justification as to why you just made bogey when it looked like for all the world you couldn’t make any worse than par.

With that in mind, put me down for a 5 at the opener. Not the worst result, but it certainly didn’t help my original goal of breaking 80.

Then it came to me as I contemplated how tight the collar of my shirt suddenly felt - ‘well, if nothing else, I went one better than Rory did when he made a 6 on the same hole yesterday’.

That’s how delusional golfers can be if it means feeling a tiny bit better about themselves after stuffing up.

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W. Smith, three handicapper from Bonnie Doon Golf Club, Sydney, suddenly comparing himself to R. McIlroy, five-time major winner from Holywood Golf Club, Belfast, and now Masters Champion.

Let’s rumble, Rory.

As we walk to the second tee our paths diverge. Rory turns right to the Masters tournament tee box, 585 yards from the green, while I head left to the Members tee, 70 yards in front of him.

This is a pattern that will continue throughout the round, with the total course yardage for the Members coming in at a friendly 6365 yards, while those vying for a green jacket play from the tips at a jaw-dropping 7555 yards. That’s what technology, and yes, athletic improvements in elite golfers, has done over the decades.

We both make par at No. 2, not what we were hoping for, but something of a nerve-settler all the same. Smith still ahead by 1.

Warren Smith while covering the 2025 Masters. Source: Supplied

That would change in a heartbeat, however, when Rory almost drives the green at the 3rd and gets up and down for birdie, while the battler from Bonnie Doon comes up short with his approach, knocks a bump-and-run third shot over the back of the finger-like peninsula where the hole is located, before ultimately making a 12-footer for bogey.

When McIlroy goes back-to back with another birdie at the par 3 fourth hole to beat my par, the margin is now two shots in favour of the 35 year old crowd favourite, and after matching pars at the 5th, a sloppy bogey at the par 3 6th - which has a back-right pin position only slightly larger than your average coffee table - has me reeling at 3-over, and three behind the current best player in the world.

Walking to the 7th tee, I decide that perhaps I should forget about trying to hang on to the coat-tails of greatness and just play some golf.

The course is everything you’ve ever imagined, its beauty is breathtaking, the greens are fabulously fun to putt on and the company is wonderful.

Let Rory do his thing and soak up what’s in front of you.

A sound idea, but then it happens.

Birdie at Seven after hitting a sand wedge to 2 feet. Birdie at Eight after two far and sure long shots. Birdie at Nine after a 9-iron to 6 feet.

For those of you scoring at home, that’s three birdies in a row heading to the turn.

What on earth is going on?!?

The three dropped shots early in the round have been erased in the space of three holes and you’re suddenly at Even par through the first nine.

Right! Where’s that McIlroy kid?

Turns out that Rory also birdied the par 4 ninth, but off the back of being rendered unconscious for 45 minutes, I’m now just one shot behind.

McIlroy 35, Smith 36.

As we well know, the Dream Masters doesn’t begin until the back nine on Sunday, even if it’s now 11am on Monday.

A scorecard to cherish forever. Source: Supplied

When people ask me what the layout at Augusta National is really like, it’s honestly hard to know where to begin.

The property that was once Berckman’s Fruitland Nursery is at least double the size it was in 1931 when Augusta National co-founders Bobby Jones and Clifford Roberts gave famed golden age of architecture genius Alister MacKenzie the brief of designing a championship course.

While the course footprint itself hasn’t changed other than new tees being built to accommodate the distance players now hit the ball, surrounding properties have been acquired over the years to allow for more patron parking, corporate hospitality and amenities for Masters competitors like the exclusive practice range that not even the members get to use.

That’s right. The range you see players warming up on is used only one week in fifty two.

The great cliche about Augusta National is that ‘you wouldn’t believe how hilly the course is’. Except it’s not a cliche at all.

I’m not exaggerating when I say that if it ever snows during Masters Week they’ll cancel the golf and hold the Olympic Downhill skiing competition on the Tenth Hole. It’s that steep.

This becomes very apparent when, just like your second shot into the Second Hole, it feels like you might topple over in trying to get your hips and shoulders level with the fairway beneath you.

I don’t know what club Rory just pulled out of the bag, but I’ve got a 5-iron in hand for my second at 10, and getting it in the air off this downslope to the extent that I can hold the green might be problematic.

The approach just falls off the putting surface to the left, but two putts later I write a 4 on the card.

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Rory, who can hit it over the moon with any club in the bag, knocks it to 10 feet and jars a putt for birdie to extend his lead to two.

And now, Ladies and Gentlemen, would you welcome the star of the show, Amen Corner!

We’ve all salivated at the thought of playing at the home of the Masters, but it’s the second shot into Number 11, the par 3 Twelfth and then par 5 Thirteenth that have had us greener that Augusta’s fairways with envy.

We know these holes so well after watching the greats of the game do battle with them year after year. The successes and many Masters-deciding failures at Amen Corner are burned into our memory.

Standing over the ball in the middle of the 11th fairway, 165 yards from the flag that is tucked in the back left corner of the green and guarded by the pond that emanates from Rae’s Creek, I’m aware that Ben Hogan has sidled up beside me and would like a word.

The greatest ball-striker there ever was once said, “If you ever see me on the green in two shots at the Eleventh, you’ll know I’ve made a mistake”.

He’d rather bring bogey into play by purposely missing the green than trying to nestle one in close and risk finding a watery grave, almost certainly guaranteeing a six, or worse.

I appreciate the advice, Mr Hogan, but I’m two behind Rory McIlroy and it’s no time to be timid.

I really wanted to hit that green in two, to show some intestinal fortitude and have a story to tell for the rest of my days, but as the ball leaves the clubface it’s immediately obvious that while I’ve managed to avoid splashing it down in the pond, I’ve also missed the green to the right hand side, somewhere in the vicinity from where Larry Mize gave Greg Norman one of many kicks in the nuts over his ill-fated Masters career.

As the club goes back in the bag, I notice a 9-time major winner in a white cap heading in the direction of the clubhouse with a wry grin on his face.

Nice chatting to you, Ben.

Unlike Lucky Larry, my chip doesn’t slay a Shark, but two putts for bogey mean the hole is halved.

McIlroy two shots clear with seven to play.

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If Augusta National’s 11th hole is anxiety-inducing, Golden Bell, the world’s most famous Par 3, has the cortisol running through you at levels that would make alarms go off at Johns Hopkins.

The Twelfth plays tricks on you from the moment you step on the tee, because while it’s beauty is unmatched anywhere in golf, there’s the pressing need of having to work out how to avoid making double bogey or worse.

Water in front, garden beds in back, flag far right and a round-wrecker just one swing away.

There’s a decent breeze in your face, so after several Hail Mary’s you pull the trigger on a 7-iron.

Lord hear my prayers, the flight is true and the ball comes down 18 feet left of the flag. A more satisfying golf shot I have never hit.

Two putts for par matches Rory, and the margin remains the same. Two.

Which brings us to Thirteen.

Is it the best golf hole on the planet? Many would argue it is, with a good drive leaving you with what Bobby Jones described as a ‘momentous decision’ to go for the green in two, or lay-up and leave yourself a potentially awkward third shot.

McIlroy and Smith are both left with no decision to make after pushed tee shots come up short of the pine trees but are too far from the green to be duelling with Rae’s Creek, so a lay-up it is.

I play to the right, out towards the big scoreboard behind the 14th tee, while Rory takes a more direct route down the left half of the fairway.

Contrasting angles of attack, but nobody, not even Smith’s regular playing partners who have long known that he’d rather look into the eyes of Medusa than play a three-quarter sand wedge, could foresee what was about to take place.

Having flipped one to 20 feet, it was all you could do to stop your chin from hitting the turf when a man who seemed to be on a coronation parade destined for the Butler Cabin, put his third shot in with the guppies.

What the hell was that???

I mean, that’s that the shot I hit, not the great Rory F. McIlroy.

Having burnt the edge with my birdie attempt for an ultimate par, Rory’s Double Bogey from Nowhere has us all locked up with five holes to play.

Smith one over the card through 13, McIlroy the same.

I couldn’t, could I?

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The short answer is no. Of course I couldn’t. I’m playing Rory McIlroy remember who, yes, may well have been on full tilt after the gag-job on the world’s best par five, and who then proceeded to make a hash of Fourteen as well, but always has an extra gear when he needs it.

Three putts at No.14 has me also dropping to two over par on the round - and while bogey it was, trust me, you cannot wipe the ridiculous smile from my face at not only playing Augusta National but also playing it well - as we contemplate the four holes remaining.

In the real world of Sunday afternoon, having stood behind the 14th green and watched Rory make bogey to now be one shot behind Justin Rose, he had the look of a man who was resigned to his fate of never winning a green jacket and never completing the career Grand Slam.

How could he? Of all the wounds suffered in recent majors, there would be no coming back from this.

McIlroy, like Greg Norman, would be left trapped in an hour glass, staring at the green jacket, while the sand beneath his feet disappeared at an ever-quickening rate.

But then he remembered who he was.

The kid from Holywood who could play shots that nobody else could.

Shots like sending a boomerang of a 7-iron around the trees at the Fifteenth that drew a football-like chant from the thousands crowded around that preposterous green site.

“RORY! RORY! RORY!”.

At a venue built on moments of genius, this was up there with any of them.

While McIlroy conspired to not make eagle from just 6 feet away, his birdie jolted him back to life, whereas I flew the green after another forced lay-up and failed to get up and down for par.

McIlroy back to 1 over, Smith 3 over par.

It was 185 yards for the Masters players to the back-right pin on No.16, 160 yards for the mere mortals playing on Monday morning.

The par three over the water would be pivotal in Jack Nicklaus winning his fifth green jacket in 1975, taking down Tom Weiskopf and Johnny Miller in a showdown for the ages.

Jack made birdie at 16, and what do you know, so did W. Smith.

A shot that never left the flag and finished two feet from the hole.

With the same 7-iron that was so good to me at Golden Bell, I’d managed to match the Golden Bear.

How about that.

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I’d closed the gap to one shot behind Rory in the Dream Masters after his birdie putt from 9 feet failed to drop, but when he hit an audacious short iron to a tough pin to two feet for birdie at No.17, my bogey from off the back edge of the green meant our fantasy duel was all but over.

One hole to play - McIlroy Even par, Smith 3 over.

We both hit nice drives through the chute up the last, and while I was hopeful of finishing with one last magic moment, my second shot was half a club too long and it settled on the top shelf from where two putts had me sign for a 75.

On a day that began with fears about not being able to live up to the opportunity I’d been presented with, to shoot that number around that golf course truly was a dream come true.

As we walked to the clubhouse for something to celebrate the occasion with, my imaginary opponent headed back to the 18th tee for a 73rd hole in his Masters week.

Rory’s dreams came true, too.

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