Abu Dhabi; World No. 2 Henrik Stenson is desperate to win a major more than anything else this season. The Swede has had four top four finishes in majors but is yet to win one and the 39-year-old sees it as his top priority even more than taking the No. 1 spot from Rory McIlroy.
“For me personally, I’ve said that quite a few times now: I would rather win a major than be world No. 1, if I had to choose between the two. Of course, I wouldn’t mind to get both at the same time. That would be nice. But I’m just working away on my game,” said Stenson, who has played in all the 10 editions of the Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship.
Stenson was keen to attain prime form ahead of the Augusta and other Majors and has put in a conscious effort to get his scheduling right.
“I feel more in control of my schedule and I have a better plan in place, and hopefully, I can get back to the preparations that I had in 2013, rather than what I had last year. I was very low on energy. When I started the year, I was kind of playing catch up most. At least the first half of the year was trying to get back to practise in terms of energy and such,” revealed Stenson.
The Augusta National is not very much to Stensons’ liking but he did post a career-best T-14 last Spring. Even the US. Open had never been all that great for Stenson until last year — again, a career-best finish (T-4) at Pinehurst No. 2.
“World No. 1 can happen in so many different ways, as we know. World Ranking is showing how you’re playing in the last two years, and particularly at the moment. So you can reach that spot in many different ways. That’s kind of out of my control; and I can only focus on my things,” added Stenson, who also won the European Tour’s season-ending DP World Tour Championship for the second-consecutive year. However, it was also his only worldwide win.
Stenson brushed aside the view that his arch rival McIlroy was distancing himself from the rivals that Tiger Woods had once built from the rest of the pack.
“Might be a little bit too early to say but we know what a great player he is and how well he can play. It’s just down to see if he can be as dominant as Tiger was. Of course, as one of the guys chasing him closely, I hope that’s not going to be the case,” felt Stenson, who was also of the view that now more players have the chance to win than in the past.
“There are lots of players out there who have chance to win now than 10- 15 years ago. We see that at the majors, as well. There are more new players who put themselves in position to win. So it’s probably tightened up quite a bit as well.”
