Adam Scott is aiming to bounce back at this week’s US PGA Championship and put the recent disappointment of his British Open flop behind him.
Scott has received reassuring advice from countryman Greg Norman and former World No.1 Rory McIlroy, who both suffered meltdowns in their quest for major glory.
Scott will be especiallly buoyed by the way McIlroy responded after his heartbreak at Augusta last year.
The Northern Irishman gave up a four-shot lead in the 2011 Masters with a final-round 80 but at the following US Open he crushed the field to win by eight shots.
Scott was cruising towards victory in the British Open last month, holding a four shot lead with four holes to play before stumbling home with four straight bogeys to lose to South African Ernie Els by a shot.
"You need to lose before you can win," McIlroy said at the World Golf Championships Bridgestone Invitational in Ohio.
"You need to learn how to handle that. I’m sure he knows what he’s done wrong, and I’m sure that when he gets himself in that position again, that he’ll do the right thing."
McIlroy sent Scott a text message immediately after the collapse, telling him to remain positive.
"I sort of felt like I knew how he was feeling," he said. "I just said to him, ‘don’t let the last four holes hide the fact that you played better than everyone else for the first 68’.
"It’s a tough loss . . . you think it’s the only chance you’re ever going to get, and your whole world came crashing down. But in reality, Adam is such a great player he is going to have plenty of chances to win major championships."
Former world No 1 and Scott’s childhood idol Greg Norman agreed, saying collapses were common in golf and it was only the major stage he was on which amplified Scott’s.
"There’s not a player on this planet who hasn’t done that," Norman said. "When you put yourself up there in that upper echelon, you’re going to get those things happening to you. Embrace them. Embrace the adversity of life and learn about how you can improve on them in any way you can."
Scott will take a far more impressive record into this week’s PGA at Kiawah Island in South Carolina.
He has finished in the top 10 three times. In 2011 he was seventh, in 2006 tied for third and in 2004 had a share of ninth place.
Scott will tee off alongside American Hunter Mahan and Spaniard Sergio Garcia.
Geoff Ogilvy plays with American Jason Dufner and Briton Paul Casey while other Victorians in the field are Robert Allenby, Aaron Baddeley and Marc Leishman.