The agony continued for World No.1 Luke Donald at the Masters on Sunday as another chance at winning a major slipped away.
The 36-year-old Englishman closed with a four-under 68, by far his best round of the week, and he settled for a three-over total of 291, well off the pace.
Donald admitted that it had been an effort even to get his motivation going for the final round, knowing that he had no chance of winning.
“Regardless of how I played, I’ll leave disappointed this week. It wasn’t what I wanted,” he said.
“But I’ll also leave with some positive feelings after today’s round. I played nicely today. Sixty-eight, I think, is my lowest round around here, or tied for the lowest round.
“It’s good memories to try and think of rather than some of the golf that wasn’t tidy enough the first three days.”
Good memories or not, Donald knows that his failure to contend this week will one again crank up the pressure on him to finally come good when it matters most — at the majors.
He has now played in 35 of them and has only six top-10 finishes to his credit, none of them in first place.
Asked what made it so hard for him to contend in the majors when he is so deadly outside of them — becoming the first man to top the money lists on both sides of the Atlentic last year — Donald said it was all about the margins.
“There’s so small a margins out here at Augusta,” he said.
“I think that’s the difference between majors and normal events. The margins are so small, you just can’t get away with it as much.
“Obviously I’ve got to work on being able to bring the game that I play at normal tournaments to the majors. I’m getting closer each time. It just takes more and more experience.
“It took me a while to learn how to win on the PGA Tour and the European Tour and win consistently.
“I think it’s the same with majors. It’s a different level and it’s just taking me a little bit of time to figure it out.”
Next up to get the monkey off his back is the US Open, which is held at the Olympic club in San Francisco June 14-17, and Donald says he intends to change his build up to that having complained of feeling tired last year at Congressional Club in Washington.
“I played four in a row with the Memorial being the fourth last year. This year I’ll play The Players, week off, Wentworth and the Memorial,” he said.