July, 2018. Shane Lowry sits in his car in the car park at Carnoustie Golf Course and cries. He’s on his way to missing the halfway cut at The Open for the fourth year in a row. He has just sacked his caddy.
“I’m not enjoying my golf at the minute,” he says to the press, “that’s the way it is, and it’s hard to take. I don’t know what to do.”
He’s lost. The idea of ever winning the Open is far from his mind.
Carnoustie in July 2018 was a crossroads moment in a career that had known more highs than lows to that point. Lowry had started with a bang as a 22-year-old when he won the Irish Open in 2009, though he couldn’t pick up the winners cheque of €500k because he was still an amateur. He was clearly ready for the Tour and he turned Pro immediately.
What followed was an impressive few years of building his reputation and bank balance. And after he won a huge US Tour event in 2015, it looked like he was ready to become one of the best in the world. The following year, Lowry looked set to win his first Major (there are four a year and they are the most coveted prizes in golf) at the US Open in Oakmont, leading the field by four strokes going into the final round but fell apart when the pressure was on. He was devastated for some time and his career trajectory turned downward for the first time.
Known for his free-wheeling demeanour and sense of humour, people started to wonder if Lowry was simply too nice or not dedicated enough to translate his massive sporting talent into superstardom. Lowry had come late to golf but sport was in his genes. His dad and two uncles had been part of the famous Offaly football team that had halted Kerry’s five-in-a-row attempt in 1982. As a youngster, Shane spotted a pitch-and-putt course close to his home and eventually persuaded his dad to let him have a go. His Dad Brendan hated golf but wouldn’t stand in his son’s way, and when Esker Hills Golf Club opened nearby, Shane dedicated himself to the sport and showed real promise. However, the step up to representative honours was slow – Shane, the boy from GAA country, took a while to convince the selectors that he was as good as the golfers from the more traditional clubs like Portmarnock and Royal Dublin. When he finally broke through, he became one of Irish golf’s most exciting young talents, though in the shadow of a superstar named Rory McIlroy.
The Open in 2019 provided an opportunity for Irish golfers to have home advantage at a major championship for the first time in 68 years. After years of preparation, Portrush would host the Open for the first time since 1951.
While many of the Irish golfers fancied their chances, with course and weather conditions likely to favour them, Shane Lowry wasn’t feeling confident. He had rebuilt his game since the disaster a year earlier, but it wasn’t where he wanted it to be and his practice rounds at Portrush had been poor.
He banished the negative thoughts and went out at Portrush determined to enjoy himself and he was in contention at the half way point. The Saturday of golf tournaments is often referred to as ‘moving day’ and, now leading the tournament, Lowry was under massive pressure to keep things together. Instead, he did a lot more than that, producing one of the greatest rounds in Open history and separating himself from the pack. He continued his good form into the final round to complete one of the most magical moments in Irish sporting history.
Framed by the two Open championships in 2018 and 2019, one a disaster and the other a triumph, this documentary will dip into the key moments of Shane Lowry’s life to create a portrait of him that captures all of his warmth and humour and delves deeply into his family history and relationships to give a comprehensive account of the story of a special champion.
It will take us to Offaly and his family life, portraying the relationships he has with his parents, his wife and the very special bond he has with his granny, who herself has become a bit of a celebrity since Shane’s Open win. She looked after him as a boy, and Shane was sure to give her a cut of his first ever earnings on tour. He even missed Rory McIlroy’s wedding to attend his granny’s 80th Birthday party.
Including interviews with Lowry, his family, friends, fellow golfers (Harrington, McGinley, McDowell, Clarke, McIlroy and Open rival Fleetwood), his close knit team, this documentary will be a comprehensive telling of Lowry’s story. It will be highly dramatic when telling the story of key moments in Lowry’s sports career but will also have a warmth and lightness of touch around telling the story of his family and background.