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Winner of the 2012 BMW Championship, Rory McIlroy, in the new BMW i3
BMW Championship: Rory McIlroy fully electrified in Chicago. Defending champion thrilled by the BMW i3: “I was surprised by the speed and
agility.”
In the run-up to the start of the BMW Championship, the
penultimate tournament in the 2013 PGA TOUR Playoffs, world number four Rory
McIlroy (NIR) and Gary Woodland (USA), who is currently well-placed in 14th in
the FedExCup rankings, took the opportunity on Tuesday to check out the future
of automobiles. The two world-class golfers tested the new fully-electric BMW
i3 in a sporting duel at the “Six Flags Great America” theme park.
This was anything but a comfortable test drive. On a
specially marked-out track, the goal was to beat the time of 36.230 seconds set
by Matt Hullins, Chief Driving Instructor at the BMW Performance Driving
Center. The two pros immediately switched into competitive mode. Both had four
attempts, and they pushed each other to ever-improving lap times. Woodland
(38.747 seconds) eventually finished with his nose just ahead of McIlroy
(39.556 seconds).