Bob MacIntyre wants to do his fairytale year 'all over again - but without the hangover'

He’s now inside the world’s top 20 and will be teeing up in all four majors next season, as well as all of the PGA Tour’s Signature Events, giving him a great opportunity to retain his spot in the European team for next September’s Ryder Cup at Bethpage Black in New York.

In an exclusive interview with The Scotsman, MacIntyre looked back on his fairytale year and talked openly about it, as well as looking forward to an exciting 2025 that will start for him in Hawaii next month.

This time 12 months ago, how excited were you as you prepared to set out as a PGA Tour card holder?

“Yeah, it was exciting, but it was also scary as I didn’t know what was to come. Obviously having the fallback of my DP World Tour card was massive when I was putting all the eggs in one basket and going for it. Even halfway through the season, I remember saying ‘I don’t want to lose full playing rights on the DP World Tour’ as that is my bread and butter, that’s where I am from, that’s the tour I started on and I never want to lose that status. Everyone in my team kept laughing at me and saying ‘stop worrying about that as you will take care of that’ and obviously I managed to do it with my win in the Scottish Open. It’s also a bit of a standing joke. They all take the mickey out of me about it, but that’s just the way I am. That’s where I started the game professionally and I always want to have a place there.”

You did a video call for the Genesis Scottish Open from Myrtle Beach and a lot of us in the media were a bit worried about how you were that day. Did we read too much into it?

“I think you all maybe looked too much into the mental side of it. I was struggling with the golf side of it. The mental side I was totally fine - I just had to find something to kickstart the golf side of it. To be honest, the last four years of my life has been great. I’ve got a great team around me, people dipping in and out of it. Family is good, Shannon [Hartley, his girlfriend] is good. Everything has been good. Obviously you are going to have highs and lows from the golf but, at the end of the day, it is just your job. You are going to have good days; you are going to have bad days. It’s about just trying to keep improving things.”

Obviously the win in Canada was huge in terms of where you are now. Do you and your dad often talk about that week?

“I don’t think I am going to realise how big that was until I am further down the line, to be honest with you. We do speak about it sometimes as it’s the one thing that a lot of the best golfers on the planet would love to achieve or love to have achieved. I mean, I did that. It is a fairytale, but I don’t think I will realise how much of a fairytale it is right now. When I’m a bit older and maybe now even playing the game and my dad is also a bit older, maybe then we’ll sit back and fully appreciate it as potentially no-one else might win with their dad on the bag at this level. Just now, I maybe don’t think it is as big a deal but down the line I think it is going to be a massive deal.”

But did winning the Genesis Scottish Open top it, especially after coming so close to winning it the year before?

“It tops it in a different way. What happened the year before, for starters. It was also the one event I went to religiously as a kid. The Barclays Scottish Open at Loch Lomond, I used to go there and I remember Gregory Havret, Johan Edfors walking out from beneath the castle at the back of the 18th green after winning behind a piper. I remember some negative sides of things there as well and that is probably one of the reasons I pushed myself in the game of golf. When I got the chance to play in my first Scottish Open in 2019, it was so exciting as it had been the one event I’d watched year in year out and that meant it was the one I wanted to win most. Then what happened the year before with Rory [McIlroy] doing the unthinkable (finishing birdie-birdie to pip him). I didn’t know after that if I was even going to get another chance to win it and for it to happen the next year with the pot of luck I got was just incredible. When I took that drop at the 16th in the final round, I said to Mike [Burrow, his caddie] these things happen for a reason and it did.”

A year ago after playing in the Ryder Cup, you openly said that if it was the only one you played in, you’d be happy. But there can be no doubt now surely that more Ryder Cup appearances are firmly in your sights?

“100 per cent. I think for all the Europeans, especially after Whistling Straits, there is a big push to try and win at Bethpage. I feel like my game has changed massively in the last year from more of an acceptance side of it. I knew my golf was good. I’d said that since I turned pro. Good golf is good golf, no matter if you are playing at Glencruitten or you are playing the Challenge Tour, DP World Tour or anywhere in the world. I said it a lot, but I didn’t believe it as much whereas now I do believe it. I think one of the things I have realised is that everyone hits bad shots. It’s about knowing you have the skills to deal with wherever that ends up, whether you are short-sided in a bunker etc. I know I am a good bunker player and have the skills to get it up and down, even though I might not achieve that every single time. It’s just about accepting you have made a mistake and then try to not make another mistake on the next hole as a reaction to that. It’s pretty simple, to be honest, but harder to implement.”

I know Luke Donald has talked about it and Paul McGinley as well, but while that template for Rome was good, it still needs to be tweaked for Bethpage as it’s a different case altogether. Are you guys aware of that?

“Oh yes. We now don’t have control of the golf course for starters whereas we had that in Rome. I thought it was planned to perfection, though the singles could maybe have gone a bit different (laughing). Overall, I thought the set up of the golf course for the statistics etc was pretty much spot on. But now going to Bethpage it is going to a golf course that will be set up for their guys and it is now about creating the team and a team environment to suit it.”

I don’t think you are even going to be in Scotland at the time but, when you get to the end of this year, what is the over-riding thought going to be?

“Just do it all over again! Yeah, the low points are low, but see the wins, they are just something incredible. I mean, the hangover I had after my Scottish Open win, I never want it again. But see the celebration I had after that, I want that every few weeks. That’s just something you never want to stop feeling. If I start winning golf tournaments and I don’t feel like that, then it is time to give up!”

But was that hangover definitely worth it?

“Oh aye. I’m not saying you should just go and celebrate something by having alcohol. It’s just simply celebrating it in a proper manner. I had so many people there that night. So many of my mates were meant to be driving home and I honestly don’t know how many people ended up staying in the house we were in. They were phoning wives and girlfriends saying ‘sorry, but we ain’t coming home tonight as we are celebrating’. That’s what it is all about, the support you get. Not just from family and friends but much wider than that.”