Lowry Ends 2011 With Top Ten Finish At Elite Dubai Championship
Thursday, 15 December 2011
Shane Lowry had a superb finish to a year in which he missed the first three months with injury. MT50300
With Sky Sports focusing firmly on the Luke Donald versus Rory McIlroy shoot out for the overall order of merit championship, Clara's Shane Lowry was coming up the outside on the Dubai trek to land a hugely impressive and worthwhile eighth place finish to round of an eventful year for the Offaly man.
Having broken his wrist last December, he missed out on the first three months of the year but to his credit bounced back and secured his place well inside the European top 60 to earn his place in last week's Dubai World Championship.
His 11 under par finish in Dubai was enough for a tie for eighth place with his old Irish Open foe Robert Rock, but on this occasion Lowry was perfectly entitled to claim his reward of almost €144,000.
He was the first player of the week to eagle the 18th hole when he chipped in on the Friday and his tee to green play was top notch. He was desperately unlucky on the greens with that vital bit of luck deserting him on occasion. Nonetheless 11 under is a terrific score and the Clara man finished the year 41st in the Race To Dubai and 121st in the World Golf Rankings.
A feature of his game this year has been his performance at big tournaments and the bigger and better the field, the better the 2009 Irish Open champion seems to respond. The BMW at Wenthworth and the Andalucia Masters were two of his top finishes this year with both being prestigious events that attracted the best in the business.
He played 25 European Tour events netting him over €750,000 in prize money while also competing in the Phoenix Open in Japan a few weeks back where he performed well and when that is taken into consideration he comes in well over the €800,000 mark for money earned.
Despite being well in the mix all weekend, the Sky Sports cameras managed to evade the promising professional as the likes of Westwood and McIlroy (who finished well below Lowry on three and nine under respectively) were deemed a greater commodity to the broadcasting giants.
Even on the final day when he frequently lay inside the top five, the eager supporters in Ireland were left disappointed and relied more on the European Tour website to monitor his progress.
Speaking after the tournament to the assembled media Lowry was upbeat about his season and is already looking forward to making waves in 2012.
'I don't want to sound cocky, but even when I was warming up on the range this morning beside Louis Oosthuizen, Luke Donald, Charl Schwartzel and Rory (McIlroy), I just felt like I belong in tournaments like these,' he said. 'It's a good feeling to have.'
Looking ahead to 2012, Lowry added: 'At the end of the year I've played some great golf, but I've been very inconsistent and have missed a lot of cuts. So, I'll just try and get a bit of consistency back into my game for next year.'
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