DUBAI — Rory McIlroy didn’t just look spent Sunday evening, he sounded spent — finally, exasperatingly seated for the first time in hours. His voice was hoarse and his shoulders seemed to have exhaled just as much as his lungs. 

McIlroy had lost a playoff but won a seventh career Race to Dubai title, all after eagling the 72nd hole — the combination of which would send any of us into the depths of our chair cushions. But at this point in his career — after a lifetime of lifting trophies in this Middle Eastern country alone — very few literal results could get McIlroy so emotional. It’s the results with special meaning that pull it out of him, and this was clearly one of those. 

European golf followers wouldn’t be surprised. About a half hour earlier, McIlroy gave a greenside interview to Sky Sports interviewer Tim Barter, where the topic of Seve Ballesteros was raised. McIlroy had passed him into second all-time for Race to Dubai titles.