Rory McIlroy Fulfils a Busy Week

Cockiness and swagger serve him on the golf course, but there's much more to golf's young phenomenon, Rory McIlroy.

The U.S. Open winner might hang with tennis great Rafael Nadal, knock back some Heinekens or slip the electronic dance sounds of Swedish House Mafia into his iPod.

Such tidbits are rolling out these days from the 22-year-old hero of Holywood, Northern Ireland, who won the tournament by eight strokes and instantly drew comparisons to Tiger Woods.

"I didn't realize how much my life would change, even in the last 10 days," McIlroy said on "Piers Morgan Tonight," aired Thursday.

As Woods has done over the years, McIlroy simply left the competition in the dust. He was the youngest winner of the tournament since the legendary Bobby Jones in 1923.

For someone under a spotlight these days, the athlete with a tousle of hair looked at ease during his interview with Morgan.

"To me, I won a golf tournament and that was the end of it," McIlroy said. But it really is bigger than that."

He paid tribute to his parents, who both worked when he grew up. His father, Gerry, held down three jobs and was a "calming influence" during the U.S. Open, said McIlroy, an only child.

The U.S. Open gave the golfer a shot of redemption after his final-round meltdown at the Masters in April.

"If anything it made me more determined to prove to people and myself that I wasn't ... a choker," McIlroy said.

While saying he was inspired by Woods, McIlroy isn't one to compare himself.

But he doesn't feel intimidated, either.

"I don't want to feel inferior to any other golfer in the world," he told Morgan. "If you do that, you give them an advantage from the start."

While the young McIlroy has one major championship, Woods has 14, including three U.S. Open wins. Woods, 35, has had no PGA wins since taking a brief leave from the game in late 2009 after admitting infidelity.

Life on the tour can bring its own problems, McIlroy conceded.

"You need a good team around you to keep you grounded."

McIlroy, who plays in the British Open next month, said he and girlfriend Holly Sweeney are a "normal couple." They have two dogs and she is completing her university degree.

A fan of boxing and soccer, McIlroy said he doesn't want the flash of fame to affect him.

After all, there are more tournaments to win.

"I'm very confident in my own abilities. I believe in myself," McIlroy said. "I'm not playing for money. I'm playing for a place in history."

Piers Tonight - CNN - Rory McIlroy

Five Players Share Lead Day One

Five players share the lead after a thrilling opening day of the Audi Cork Irish Masters at the Fota Island Resort in Cork, Ireland.

The event, the sixth of the 2011 EuroPro Tour season, features the best up-and-coming British and Irish golfers with more than 150 men battling for the £10,000 top prize. This was the first time the Tour had held an event at Fota Island, a venue that had previously hosted the Irish Open on the main European Tour.

Conditions were very wet at the start of the day and Jamie Abbott was an early clubhouse leader as his flawless round of -4 (68) included birdies at the second, seventh, tenth and 18th.

Abbott (Fynn Valley, Suffolk, pictured) won the opening event of the season at Wensum Valley, Norfolk but failed to make the cut at the other two EuroPro Tour events he has played this year.

However, Abbott was later joined on -4 by England’s Ian Ridgway, South African Darryn Lloyd, Scotsman Shaun McAllister (Craigielaw, East Lothian) and Ireland's Neil O'Briain, who would have had an overnight lead if had not double bogeyed the 18th.

Graeme Dunlea (Adare, County Limerick), Paul Maddy (Gog Magog, Cambridgeshire) and Adam Hodkinson are a shot further back on -3 (67). It promises to be a fantastic, hard-fought competition as more than a dozen players are on -2 after rounds of 68.

Chris Hanson (Woodsome Hall) and Graeme Clark (Doncaster) are first and second in the Order of Merit respectively, but both need solid rounds on Thursday if they are to make the cut.

Hanson, who has won two of the five tournaments so far in 2011, described his round as ‘very average’ as he made birdies at the 10th and 17th but a bogey at the 15th and double at the par-four sixth left him on +1 (73).

Graeme Clark is also on the same score, although he made a good start with two birdies in the first four holes of the front nine but bogeys at three of the next four saw him drop down the leaderboard.

Andy Shakespear (Benton Hall, Essex) held a share of the lead with four birdies in the opening five holes but it proved to be much ado about nothing as he made three bogeys in his next six holes.

All of the entrants will play a second round on Thursday and at the end of that the top 50 plus ties will advance to the final round on Friday where the overall champion will collect £10,000.

The action is being filmed and Matchroom sport will produce a two-hour highlights package that will be broadcast on Sky Sports on Wednesday, July 20.

Galea Pleads Guilty to Drug Charges

A Canadian sports doctor whose high-profile clients have included Tiger Woods and Alex Rodriguez pleaded guilty in federal court Wednesday to bringing unapproved drugs, including human growth hormone, into the United States to unlawfully treat professional athletes.

Dr. Anthony Galea, a healing specialist from Toronto who was sought out by the biggest names in sports, was indicted by a federal grand jury in October on charges that he smuggled human growth hormone and other substances into the United States and lied to border agents to avoid getting caught. He faces similar charges in Canada.

Some of the U.S. charges were dismissed with his plea.

Galea, who wasn’t licensed to work in the United States, was accused of treating 20 professional athletes at their homes, hotels and friends’ houses from October 2007 to September 2009.

The indictment did not identify any clients, but prosecutors said they included golfers, professional baseball and football players and others.

Galea, 51, pleaded guilty in front of U.S. District Judge Richard Arcara, eliminating the need for a trial — along with the likelihood that evidence and witness statements could publicly reveal information about who he visited or billed.

Galea, who’s married with seven children, agreed to forfeit $275,000 before sentencing Oct. 19. He was released until sentencing, at which he could get up to two years in prison.

The doctor, who has a vocal cord disorder, answered the judge politely in a croaking voice and said he wouldn’t appeal.

Woods, who recently announced he would skip the British Open next week because of “minor injuries” that haven’t fully healed, has said he’s been treated by Galea but didn’t receive performance-enhancing drugs. The New York Mets’ Jose Reyes and Carlos Beltran also have acknowledged talking to federal authorities during the investigation.

Rodriguez, the New York Yankees’ star slugger, told Major League Baseball officials that he didn’t receive performance-enhancing drugs from Galea after the doctor told The Associated Press he had prescribed anti-inflammatories for him.

Prosecutors alleged some athletes received injections of HGH, banned by major sports, and Actovegin, a derivative of calf’s blood not approved for use in the United States. They also said some athletes were given intravenous Actovegin drips and platelet-rich plasma therapy, a treatment used to speed healing that involves extracting blood from patients and re-injecting just the plasma.

Galea was widely known for using platelet-rich plasma therapy. He became the focus of Canadian and U.S. authorities’ attention in September 2009, when his assistant, Mary Anne Catalano, was stopped at the border in Buffalo with a small quantity of human growth hormone, Actovegin and vials of foreign homeopathic drugs.

Catalano is scheduled to be sentenced later this month after pleading guilty to a count of lying to border agents. As part of her plea, she’s been cooperating in the investigation.

The U.S. criminal complaint charged Galea with conspiracy, smuggling, distributing human growth hormone and introducing an unapproved drug into interstate commerce.

U.S. charges of smuggling, conspiring to lie to federal agents and defraud the U.S. government and distributing HGH were dismissed with Galea’s plea.

In October 2009, Canadian authorities charged Galea, the former team doctor of the Canadian Football League’s Toronto Argonauts, with selling Actovegin, conspiracy to import an unapproved drug, conspiracy to export a drug and smuggling.

Galea was accused of making multiple trips to U.S. cities from 2007 to 2009 to meet with athletes from Major League Baseball, the National Football League and the Professional Golfers’ Association and injecting at least seven with a drug mixture containing human growth hormone.

He was accused of injecting at least one NFL player with Actovegin and providing a retired player with human growth hormone after his playing days had ended. He billed three football players about $200,000, prosecutors said.

The Irish Golf Club Gazette On-line

The Irish Golf Club Gazette is a marketing company with a focus on social network marketing within the golf sector. We provide social network strategy, management and consulting for our clients. 

Traditional advertising with one-way interaction is becoming obsolete and companies must now engage with r clients and with over 700 million active social network users, it is impossible not to if you want to stay in business.

The solutions we can provide allow our clients to manage an effective social network strategy on their own or leave it up to us to help out. 

Although the social network websites are all free, managing them is a very labour intensive activity and most businesses do not manage it properly. This can be a full time job and we understand that our clients cannot afford to employ a person to manage this end of marketing.

With the Irish Golf Club Gazette on-line services it is a partnership that lets do the social networking, and pilot a campaign with our experience and knowledge. Not only of social media but also golf course industry knowledge. 

Our role is to help golf club managers make that leap into social media marketing world which can be confusing and difficult to manage at the outset. 

Like golf, our focus will be to reduce your social network handicap.

The Ballyliffin Pro Am

The Ballyliffin Pro-Am takes place over both links at Ireland’s most northerly links on July 23rd and 24th with practice rounds available on July 22nd.

The largest pro-am in Europe, with 104 teams, brings golfers from all over Ireland, Britain and USA together for one of the best weekends in the Irish PGA calendar.

Contact the Irish PGA or Ballyliffin GC for entry forms.

Ballyliffin Youth Summer Camp runs from July 11th-13th from 10 am-2pm. 

The fee of €70 includes tuition, meals, gift and competitions. The event is open to all children of eight years and older – non members welcome. 

Details at 074-9378100.

www.ballyliffingolfclub.com