– Rory McIlroy has just finished his 2025 with a 14th place at the Australian Open and firmly established as the Number 2 in the world, only behind an unreachable Scottie Scheffler, whose dominance in the world ranking hasn’t been seen since the days of the best Tiger Woods.
– Rory will remember 2025, undoubtedly one of the best of his career, if not the best, for the Career Grand Slam, which he completed in April with his victory at the Masters. But beneath this invaluable achievement and the five Majors that adorn his record, there are other statistics that surely hold the same or even greater importance…
– The fact is that just a few days ago marked 16 years since the Northern Irishman first entered the world top ten. On 15 November 2009, Rory finished second at the Hong Kong Open, a result that allowed him to reach Number 10 in the world… From this point in his career, there are some records that truly cause vertigo.
– Since then, 835 weeks have passed, a little over 16 years, and in all this time Rory has only been outside the world top ten for 46 weeks. Pay close attention to the following fact: since that 15 November 2009, his worst position in the world ranking has been Number 16… and he was only there for one week (year 2021)!
– Rory has been 122 weeks as World Number One. Additionally, he has been 206 weeks as Number 2 in the world and another 151 weeks he has spent as Number 3 in the world. So out of the 835 weeks that have passed since he first broke into the world top ten, it turns out that 479 have been spent within the world top 3, which is something like his ‘natural place in the world’.
– Approximately a year before reaching the world top ten for the first time, specifically on 23 November 2008, Rory also finished second at the Hong Kong Open (what a coincidence) and thanks to that result, he entered the world top 50 for the first time… It has been a little over 17 years since then and it almost goes without saying that McIlroy has not left that top 50.
– And there’s more to come, at 36 years of age. If anyone can surpass Phil Mickelson’s record, it certainly seems to be him. The Californian’s feat was indeed out of this world: he managed to string together almost 26 consecutive years, week after week, within the world top 50: from week 48 of 1993 to week 44 of 2019 (he would later return to that top 50, but we’re talking about consecutive weeks). Tiger’s record in the world top 50 consecutively falls just short of fifteen years: his longest stretch was from week 42 of 1996 to week 40 of 2011.
