Back on home soil and the focus of attention, Tom McKibbin is relishing the chance to perform in front of local fans again at this week’s ISPS Handa World Invitational.
The 20-year-old from Holywood already has a DP World Tour title to his name this year after claiming the Porsche European Open in June on what was only his 26th start.
“I’ve played this event [ISPS Handa] the last couple of years but it’s special to come back here this week and I’m very much looking forward to it and it should be a great week,” said Tom.
“It was cool to get that win in my first year. Besides that, I think I’ve played pretty consistently through the first half of the year and it’s been quite nice to see a lot of top 25s, top 20s and I think that spurred me on.”
McKibbin is making his third appearance in this week's tournament, having first taken part when it was sanctioned by the Challenge Tour in 2019 and is aiming to improve on a tenth-place finish last year.
The event - tri-sanctioned by the DP World Tour, LPGA Tour and Ladies European Tour - sees some of the best male and female golfers compete on the same courses at the same time, with links venue Castlerock joining Galgorm, a historic parkland course, as the new co-host.
“I’m very proud,” said Tom of having the innovative event at ‘home’.
“I think they’re great venues they have for the event and it’s set up nicely with the two fields, the men and the women, and I think it’s a pretty cool event.
“Castlerock is a good course. I think it’ll play quite tricky this week with a few of what are usually par fives playing as par fours this week. It’ll be interesting to see the scoring, here at Galgorm is great, it gets better every year.
“I’m looking forward to playing it, I’d say it’s one of the tougher venues we play all year so it should be good.”
Tom tees off today at Galgorm (1.03 pm) in the company of Ryder Cup hopeful Victor Perez and defending champion Ewen Ferguson.
"I had a nice break to recharge the batteries and it is nice to come back with some good memories from last year and hopefully, I can make a good defence of my title,” said the Scot.
“I am quite happy with where my game is at and I feel like I can get some good results between now and the end of the season. Hopefully, I can start here.
“It helps coming back to some of the courses that I know towards the end of the year. I love Galgorm to bits, I have always played well there. I have not played Castlerock before so I am still gauging it. I feel good coming into the rest of the season, hopefully starting this week I can get a [good] result.”
