‘I’m not a caddie-firer or anything’: Shane Lowry explains looper split

Shane Lowry says he’s “not exactly a caddie-firer or anything.” 

But the Irishman also said Sunday a bad start to the year had gotten to him, and that was his explanation for the separation between him and longtime looper Brian “Bo” Martin. The 2019 Open Championship-winning duo split at the end of January, and Lowry now has Darren Reynolds on his bag. 

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“Yeah, kind of — like at the time, it kind of came out of nowhere,” Lowry said after his play at the Players Championship. “We started in the Middle East, and I had a bad couple of weeks, and we just kind of — we had a chat and things weren’t going — when I sit down and look at it things that weren’t going as well as I probably thought. 

“It got to me a little bit, and I just needed some fresh — I knew, when it happened, I had no one in mind, no one lined up, so I didn’t know what to do.”

According to the Independent, the relationship had been souring. 

The website said that the Lowry was seen ranting at Martin during the third round of last year’s Masters over a misclubbing, and sources told the site that Lowry’s start to this year confirmed that the duo had lost its “mojo.” Lowry had opened 2023 with a tie for 28th at the DP World Tour’s Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship — he was tied for the lead going into the final round — and he missed the cut the next week at the Hero Dubai Desert Classic, also a DP World Tour event. 

Soon after, they were done. Martin had carried for Lowry since 2018, a run that saw them win three times — the 2019 Open at Royal Portrush, the 2019 Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship and last year’s BMW PGA Championship. He had replaced Dermot Byrne, who had been Lowry’s caddie for nine years.

“I’ve had two caddies my whole career, and I’ve been on Tour 14 years,” Lowry said. “I’m not exactly a caddie-firer or anything. This is my third caddie.”

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Two weeks after Dubai, Lowry played the PGA Tour’s Waste Management Open, and Reynolds was aboard. Lowry said he had been caddying for pro Alex Levy.

“I’ve known Darren for years,” Lowry said. “He had just started with Alex Levy on the European Tour. That’s almost why I didn’t want to ask him, because I knew he just got a new job and I didn’t want to take him away and then it not work out for us. But, frankly, he was one of the few options I had, and we just had a chat. He caddied for me during Covid for a few weeks when Bo couldn’t, and yeah, it’s been going pretty good.”

The Players marked the pair’s fifth event together, over five weeks. They missed the cut at the WM, tied for 14th at the Genesis Invitational, tied for fifth at the Honda Classic, finished 67th at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, and tied for 35th at the Players. 

Up next for Lowry is the WGC-Match Play in two weeks, followed by the Masters two weeks after that.

“That week in Phoenix was a bit weird for me, and I felt a bit different,” Lowry said. “But thankfully we went to L.A. and we had a decent result, and then we went and contended at the Honda. Bay Hill didn’t go to play, but Bay Hill is not a place I typically go, and then but for the first round here, we’ve had a decent week this week, so it’s gone well so far.”