The 43-year-old Englishman on his return to the Dubai Duty Free Irish Open, the belief he can lift the Claret Jug, what his new deal with DP World means for the game in the Middle East, the health of the European Tour and being an easy target for the world’s best golf impersonator

With Kent Gray
I’m playing the Dubai Duty Free Irish Open, the Scottish Open, then the Open Championship, then straight into the WGC-FedEx St. Jude Invitational, so four weeks in a row. Is that too much golf? You know, I haven’t found the winning formula, because I haven’t won a major yet, so for me it’s about balancing the whole season, making sure I’m comfortable with the schedule and just making sure I’m ready to go when it’s time to go. I’ve played where I had two weeks off before majors, I’ve done it where I’ve had two weeks’ on before majors. There’s no real right or wrong way of doing it.

I’ve not played the new Dubai Duty Free Irish Open venue, Lahinch Golf Club. Generally, when it comes to a situation like that, I feel particularly relaxed. I love when golf is relatively straightforward, in its natural form. Links golf, to me, is very, very enjoyable to play, so just to have that, to have the opportunity to play three weeks of links golf is great.

For me, it’s about getting used to the green complexes at Lahinch, the type of slopes, and feeling fresh and ready to go. It’s not something where I feel like I need to play 18 holes Tuesday, 18 holes Wednesday, to feel ready to on play. I’ll just play the Pro-Am and go for it.

Winning the Houston Open on the PGA Tour last year gave me a lot of confidence. When you put yourself in that situation and you ask yourself a question, it’s all about can you come up with the answer?  Being able to come up with the answer was a big step forward.

My golf game has become a lot more consistent in the last two years. I feel more comfortable in myself with how things have progressed. I had a run this year at Augusta National, put myself in contention on the back nine which is what you’re after. So you know, if I keep putting myself in good positions, hopefully we can get a couple more wins.

I’m well overdue in Europe, you’re right [Poulter hasn’t won a pure European Tour title since 2011]. It’s been a long time, it’s been too long. I think it’s been a crazy couple of years, there’s a lot going on obviously since the fall down the world ranking, spent some time out with injury, coming back from injury, contending at The Players, moving back up in the world ranking, it’s been a lot of golf played. I’m excited to get a few good weeks under my belt in Europe and trying to crack the winners circle again.

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The Open Championship is one of those tournaments where I feel like I’ve got a chance. I’ve had a couple of close calls [including finishing second to Padraig Harrington in 2008], I’ve been in the mix. But they’re never easy. For starters, you’ve got to have the right side of the draw. Generally, there’s weather on one side of the draw and then, of course, you need to play exceptionally well.

You don’t have to be the longest off the tee at The Open but you do have to play smart golf and I do like what links golf offers us. Shot making ability, playing hold up shots, draws, playing cut shots. You’re always working towards a goal of ‘can I hit the right shot at the right time?’ I feel like my game is in a good enough form to be able to do that and the Scottish Open is a good week going into The Open to get enough good visuals and enough good shots where I can take that step further at the Open.

It’s a big thing to move The Open back to Northern Ireland and I think the fans at Royal Portrush are going to love it. They deserve it. They are very, very, very good fans, amazingly respectful, extremely knowledgeable and they come out in the masses. They love their golf, they are passionate about their golf and its fitting that we obviously go there and actually enjoy a good golf course.

Is that going to be a problem to me if I don’t win a major? No. Will I sleep at night? Yeah, I’m gonna sleep pretty well. I don’t look at it as some might look at it but it doesn’t stop the will to want to win one.

I think the [golf impersonator] Conor Moore is great. It’s always great to have the fun made out of you in all aspects. It’s a sign of flattery I guess that there’s a reason why he has taken the opportunity to impersonate you. So, I find it very, very funny and so do a lot of other people. Conor is a funny guy. I’ll leave that up to everyone else to judge [if he does a good impersonation of Poulter or not], rather than me to judge but it’s always good to laugh. Laughing is a great drug.

I’ve played the DP World [Tour Championship] now for so many years, I’ve had what I would say is quite a lot of success in the event and obviously I love playing that tournament. So to be able to be a brand ambassador for an organisation who have very similar goals, ideas, philosophies when it comes to trying to grow the game, that sits very well with me, trying to grow the game to a wider audience, trying to grow it to the younger generation of kids. DP World wants to grow the game and being a father of four, I’m always trying to help my kids improve and enjoy the game of golf. I’d like to grow the game as much as possible and that’s just one aspect of where it sits very well with me working alongside DP World.

We’ve got a very fun social media campaign which should be coming out very soon, which I did with Luke, my son, at one of DP World’s ports in the UK. That was really, really enjoyable to do. We’ll also schedule in a lot of stuff with kids when I’m in Dubai. To me, it’s a great partnership and hopefully, it’s going to be a very long-standing partnership.

Yeah, the Race To Dubai is a huge goal. I think to win the Order of Merit is always something which would be another box checked, so being well placed after these three weeks [around The Open] are crucial to that and then obviously the BMW PGA Championship coming up in September, and then obviously you’ve got a couple of events at the end of the year. It’s quite exciting to be in a strong [OOM] position already. If I can have a very strong second half of the season then hopefully I can be in with a chance at the last event, at the DP World Tour Championship, and obviously try and win that tournament and take the R2D title.

It’s always difficult for The European Tour, week in and week out, to compete against the PGA Tour but to be able to make the DP World Tour Championship the biggest purse [US$3 million] in golf is a big thing. It’s obviously going to be a big draw so it’s definitely good for the game.

As strong as the PGA Tour season is, you can’t compete with them week in week out. For the European Tour to be able to put a number of very big events on, it’s good for them to be able to do that because we as players, if you’re a top 15 in the world player, if you’re a player that actually lives in America, for the most part, it is difficult to play two full seasons in one. I’ve done it now for 15 straight years and it hasn’t been easy and the last few years have been more difficult.

The European Tour has made it a lot easier for those global players. You need to play [just] four events outside of the majors and the WCGs, so with that in mind Keith [Pelley] and the European Tour has done a great job with being able to keep the European players coming back. The purses in the Rolex series of events has obviously grown and I think Keith and the team have done a good job with how the tour has continued to grow in a very difficult marketplace. It really isn’t very easy and I know it’s been a challenge for him and the business model so they have done a great job.