ORLANDO, Fla. — Rory McIlroy withdrew from the third round of the PGA Tour’s Arnold Palmer Invitational on Saturday after he felt muscle spasms in his back that were not going away.
They were not thought be to serious enough to keep the five-time major champion from Northern Ireland out of The Players Championship next week at TPC Sawgrass in Ponte Vedra Beach. McIlroy, 36, won the tournament last March in a standout season that included him winning the Masters a month later to complete the career Grand Slam.
Even so, it was his first significant issue with his back since the Tour Championship in 2023, which he played with discomfort. A month later, he went 4-1 and led Europe to a Ryder Cup victory in Italy.
The No. 2 player in the Official World Golf Ranking is approaching a big stretch of the season that culminates with the first major of the year, the Masters on April 9-12 at Augusta National in Georgia.
McIlroy withdrew about 30 minutes before his tee time Saturday at Bay Hill Club. One of his managers said he experienced muscle spasms that would not stop as he tried to warm up on the range in warm weather.
It was only the third time McIlroy has been forced to withdraw from a tournament in his PGA tour career. He left the Nedbank Golf Challenge in 2009 with a flu virus and food poisoning, and he withdrew from the Honda Classic in the middle of the second round in 2013, first citing a sore wisdom tooth and a week later apologizing by saying his head was not in the right place.