We all know how seriously Gareth Bale takes his golf and he’s now getting tips from one of the best around.
The Welsh football legend, who famously played for Tottenham and Real Madrid, has had plenty of time on the course since hanging up his boots in January 2023 and now he can count Rory McIlroy as one of his golfing allies.
Bale is a huge golf fan and enjoyed the chance to pick the four-time major winner’s brainX: @DPWorldTour
Bale and McIlroy enjoyed some one-on-one time during the Wentworth celebrity Pro-Am at the BMW PGA Championship in which the Northern Irish star handed out some welcome advice.
Caught on camera, McIlroy could be heard saying: “When I work on my swing and if I’ve got swing thoughts going into a tournament, I’ll start losing awareness of the target.
“You make this [pointing to his hands] the important part, where the important part is actually [pointing towards the course in front of him].
“It’s hard to separate, it’s hard to leave it on the range and just go and play.”
McIlroy later continued: “My peak velocity in my golf swing is two feet before impact.
“[Before] I would lose speed coming in at the ball, because I wasn’t strong enough to hold it. So I did a lot of work on that.”
Clearly keen to soak up as much knowledge as he could, Bale said: “Sounds similar to mine a little bit. I always lose my balance, I don’t know if I can hold it enough.
“To be fair, I haven’t been in the gym at all during football. Because you’re training so much, but now to try and hold it.”
McIlroy has been enjoying his outing at the BMW PGA Championship after his gutting collapse at the US Open and then missing the cut at The Open.
The four-time major winner did, however, endure a bizarre moment when his club head went flying into the distance on the fairway of the 12th during round one.
“I don’t think it’s ever happened to me before,” McIlroy said of the club head flying off.
“I hit nine iron on the ninth hole and it looked as if the ferrule was coming loose, but it was actually the head detaching from the shaft.
“I obviously didn’t realise that when I hit the shot on 12. It was a bit of a weird feeling. I hit the ball and obviously you’re expecting the weight of the club to just pull through and there was nothing there.
“Thankfully the ball went where I wanted it to. It could have been a lot worse but thankfully got it repaired and got it back on the 16th.
“I’ve certainly broken a few [clubs] after shots, but I don’t remember when a head’s flown off on me like that, because the shaft was intact. Just glued the shaft back in and we were ready to go again.
Despite that, McIlroy is firmly part of the chasing pack at the tournament at Wentworth moves into day three.
