Exclusive:'My hands were in pain' - Bob MacIntyre on grafting to get game in shape for US Open
Sole Scot in field at Shinnecock Hills opens up about feeling better about his game after feeling he’d gone down ‘rabbit hole’
Bob MacIntyre, last year’s runner-up, believes he’s come out of a “rabbit hole” in the nick of time heading into the 126th US Open at Shinnecock Hills after “grafting my arse off” and putting himself through some pain in the process.
The Oban man started the 2026 major campaign with high hopes on the back of his brilliant US Open effort last year at Oakmont, where it took a birdie-birdie finish from J.J. Spaun to deny him, only to miss the cut in both The Masters and PGA Championship.
He’s now aiming to rediscover his major mojo in this week’s USGA event on Long Island, having handed himself a timely boost with a top-15 finish on Sunday in the RBC Canadian Open.
In an insightful interview with The Scotsman on the eve of the season’s third major, MacIntyre opened up about how he’d been guilty of “neglecting” aspects of his game this year but feeling he has now learned some valuable lessons.
The 29-year-old also spoke about how he’d turned up on the range in Toronto at 7am last Monday and, under the watchful eye of coach Simon Shanks, hit ball after ball for two days after getting to a stage where he felt he’d struck shots a certain shape only to look up and see it was actually totally opposite.
“Aye,” he replied to being asked if this event had been one he’d been particularly looking forward to after his eye-catching effort in Pennsylvania 12 months ago. “But, to be honest, I am just looking forward to it because I feel like I am finding a bit of a golf game.
“I’ve been absolutely grafting my arse off the last five or six weeks since I felt my game wasn’t in the shape it had been. Simon came out last week and he wasn’t going to go home until I felt my game was in better shape. I was coming away on Monday and Tuesday and my hands were in pain, but it is something you’ve got to do.”
MacIntyre, who became a dad earlier this year, with partner Shannon and son Findlay both out here with him this week and mum Carol on nannying duties, added: “Last year we did a lot of training camps before events. This year obviously life has changed a little bit, so there are different priorities.
“I feel like we’ve done a lot of testing and we’ve kind of gone down a rabbit hole of not keeping an eye on the technique. We’ve let it drift a bit whereas I need to be more on top of that. But it’s been a learning curve for me.
“Look, life is completely different and it’s a great thing. But, on the golf side, I’ve just neglected a few things. We’ve hopefully caught that early enough, though, so that it’s not a problem.”
No-one could ever accuse MacIntyre, who is the sole Scot in this week’s 156-strong field, of not putting in enough effort at any stage of his career to date, so having sore hands tells you everything about the work he put in last week.
“I mean, that’s the first time in a long time that my hands have been sore,” he admitted, smiling. “I can stand there and hit golf ball after golf ball and bag after bag. I think turning up on Monday morning in Canada at 7am with Simon, I think even the staff and volunteers at the course were like ‘what’s he doing?’ And Mike [Burrow, his caddie] was doing shuttle runs back and forwards to get the balls.
“It was just a matter that I felt certain things were wrong with the golf game, certain things wrong with the equipment and I felt like it was a case of us trying to put a jigsaw together. I feel far better about my game standing here right now than I did.
“I keep an eye on things and I’ve been looking at the stats. Putting this year has been as good as it’s ever been. I’m driving the ball as good as I ever have. Iron play has just been off, but we probably went too much off the result of that stat. When we actually pulled it apart, it was only four or five holes of the season that made the stats look as bad as they are.
“Certain holes like the fourth at Hilton Head. I hit two balls in the water there and it is costing you so many shots. I probably didn’t look into it in enough detail and I just went down a rabbit hole. But, thankfully, I am kind of coming out of that rabbit hole now.”
As he sat in the scorer’s area at Oakmont to see if he’d done enough to become a major champion, MacIntyre delivered a great show of sportsmanship as he applauded Spaun holing a huge birdie putt across the 18th green in the final round and mouthing “wow”.
“It pops up every now and again,” he replied to being asked about that great video clip. “That was the confirmation that I can win one of these. So now it is literally all about preparation and getting myself feeling good about my game and being somewhat confident knowing that we can hit certain shots. There are certain holes out there that you just can’t miss it on a certain side.”
Shinnecock Hills has been described in the build up to its sixth US Open as a “piece of Scotland washed ashore on Long Island”, with the first of those previous editions here being won by Scot James Foulis in 1896.
“A bit different than what I expected, to be honest,” said MacIntyre, offering his thoughts on this week’s set up. “I know they had a backlash from the last time this event was here. I remember watching it on TV and seeing some people chasing golf balls around greens (laughing). I think that said enough and I think some other people have got control of the golf course this year.
“With the weather that is coming in (wind gusting up to 40mph on Thursday), they couldn’t have had it the way I thought it was going to be. I mean, you just wouldn’t be playing golf. I think the course is a fair test. And that’s how it should be.”
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