Rory McIlroy withdraws from tournament despite previously receiving massive multi-million fine
Rory McIlroy will not will play in the RBC Heritage this month, despite the decision previously costing him more than $2million.
After an exciting and competitive weekend at the iconic Augusta National golf course in Georgia, McIlroy made history as he became only the fourth player to win The Masters in consecutive years.
Although he topped the leaderboard at the end of every day, the Northern Irishman made sure to keep the tournament interesting, eventually only winning by one shot.
Following the win, McIlroy has decided to withdraw from the RBC Heritage, a signature PGA Tour event that typically is held held the week after The Masters.
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Despite not being a major, the Heritage boasts a prize fund of $20m (£14.8m), only 2.5m (£1.9m) less than what is available at Augusta.
But McIlroy is clearly not worried about missing out on the money, as he was once fined several million dollars for withdrawing from the same event back in 2023.
His withdrawal in 2023 came as he looked to take some time to 'get some things in place' after missing the cut at The Masters that year.
"I had my reasons to not play Hilton Head and I've expressed those to [PGA Tour Commissioner] Jay [Monahan]," McIlroy said at the time.
"It was an easy decision, but I felt like if that fine or whatever is to happen was worth that for me in order to get some things in place."
However, in doing so McIlroy was handed a massive £2.2m fine for breaching a PGA Tour rule at the time that stated that players ranked in the top 20 of the Player Impact Program (PIP) had to compete in all but one of the 17 signature events.
Earlier in the year the golf star had missed the Sentry Tournament of Champions in Hawaii, meaning he was made to forfeit his share of the $12m (£8.9m) PIP bonus - a total of around £2.2m.
Thankfully for McIlroy, this rule is no longer in place as of 2024, when the PGA Tour decided instead to increase the prize money for their events to encourage participation, instead of enforcing it with fines.
Therefore, it appears unlikely that the 36-year-old will face any backlash for missing out on the RBC Heritage, something he'll be happy to hear after all but confirming that he wouldn't regularly play the tournament after finishing T41 in one of only two appearances back in 2020.
He said: "Once I got here and I played the golf course, I sort of remembered why I haven't been here for a while. It's tough.
"It's a lovely place. There's other courses on Tour that probably fit my game a little bit better and obviously the week after the Masters is always a tough one.
"Guys like to come here and decompress, but my idea of decompression is not seeing golf clubs for a week."
Topics: Rory Mcilroy, Golf
Ben McCrum