Dubai: Martin Kaymer is a ‘better person’ ahead of this week’s Omega Dubai Desert Classic after blowing a 10-shot lead on the final day of the Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship two weeks ago.
The German would have extended his record three wins in the capital to four if he had held on for victory, but he instead equalled the unenviable European Tour record for the biggest lead lost with his back-nine meltdown.
Despite the humiliation, the World No 12 double major winner implied he had learnt more from that defeat than any of his 22 career wins, and said that he had come into this week’s tournament at Emirates Golf Club more at peace with himself after a heart-to-heart with his family.
“I know the reasons because I’ve had plenty of time to reflect,” said Kaymer, who followed up his 2010 PGA Championship win with the US Open last year. “It was nice to speak to my dad [Horst] and brother [Philip] about it, because it’s important to realise what’s going wrong.
“Obviously, it’s something fairly private that you don’t want to talk to everyone about, so it was nice when I could be open with my brother and dad about it. Sometimes the truth can be hard but if you don’t face the truth, then I don’t think you grow as much as you could.”
Kaymer, who lost his mother Rina to cancer in 2008 and was rumoured to be dating Sky News Sports presenter Kirsty Gallacher — the daughter of Scottish golfer Bernard and cousin to Dubai defending champion Stephen — didn’t openly reveal the reasons for his collapse in Abu Dhabi but alluded to over-confidence and the need for renewed humility.
“You think you do things that are right for you, and you think you act in a way that might make you more successful or happier, but they don’t,” he added. “When you start off a tournament and lead by several shots and make birdies you feel like not much could go wrong. But in golf, too much confidence can hurt.
“Therefore realising certain things, how I felt on the course, is not the person I am and it’s not the person I want to be. It didn’t feel natural to me, it’s a situation you don’t want to be in, but somehow you got into it. And then you ask yourself instead of ‘how did I get into it?’ you ask ‘why did I get into it?’ And I got all those answers.
The 2010 Race to Dubai winner said he’s now better placed for the future after his moment of self-discovery. “It’s not nice when it happens, but afterwards, you are even more motivated because you’ve grown as a golfer and a person, and you become more mature. It was almost a life lesson, not only a lesson in golf.
“Even though I would have loved to have won [in Abu Dhabi], this year it was more important to lose in order to win more in the future. I wouldn’t call it a bad experience, because it’s not. It created a bad result on the scorecard, but it creates a lot of truth about yourself; that we are not machines; that we are not German engineering. It works, but once in a while it gets stuck too. Therefore it was a brilliant day for me.”
Of his chances in Dubai this week, where he previously finished second by a stroke to Tiger Woods in 2008, Kaymer added: “I feel good, I feel very calm, because I’m fine with what happened.
“I don’t see it as a negative because I didn’t lose much, I lost some world rankings points, a trophy and some money. But I can handle that. This week, I enjoy the place, I have good memories here. There’s a good field, so there’s nothing really that you shouldn’t look forward to. So, I approach this week as a happy Martin Kaymer. Every moment in your career has an impact, and you change whether you want to or not. So, I must agree, yes, I come to Dubai as a different person.”
