For the reigning Augusta National Women’s Amateur champion, a return to the hallowed grounds was already a dream, but an unexpected encounter with Rory McIlroy left her utterly speechless. On April 5, the ANWA shared a video on X where Carla Bernat Escuder spoke about how well Rory treated her.
“He was very nice when I met him…” she said. “I really wanted to scream. I’ve been a fan of him since I was a kid. I didn’t know he was that nice.”
When two champions meet.#ANWAgolf pic.twitter.com/lOeWRhkN27
— Augusta National Women’s Amateur (@anwagolf) April 5, 2026
Bernat Escuder was dumbfounded. “He was so casual, like, ‘Hey Carla, what’s up?’ And hugged me,” she said. “And I’m like, whoa. So am I supposed to treat him like a bro now?”
The context behind their conversation, however, gives the moment a significance that ties back to one of the biggest shots of McIlroy’s career.
How Carla Bernat Escuder’s ANWA putt shaped Rory McIlroy’s moment
Augusta National recently released a documentary on YouTube, which is a hole-by-hole account of McIlroy’s historic 2025 final round at Augusta National. The win is not news to anyone; however, McIlroy reveals a story behind the winning putt.
“Before Justin hit his putt, I marked my ball,” McIlroy said in the documentary. “I had watched a large part of the final round of the ANWA live, and the Spanish girl who ended up winning had a very similar putt to win. I remember seeing it, and that it actually didn’t do much, maybe it broke a touch to the right, so I felt like I had seen that putt before. I put my ball on the green, went through my routine, and simply told myself: it’s inside left and make a good stroke.”
When McIlroy met Bernat Escuder just moments before the 2026 edition of ANWA, he told her that her putt had helped him understand the break. For her, a lifelong fan standing in front of one of the greatest players in the sport’s history, it was almost too much to comprehend.
“Now I can tell he’s a really good person more than a player,” she said. “That’s very important for me.”
But McIlroy isn’t the only one who drew inspiration from watching a different tournament. Scottie Scheffler, inspired by the focus and mental fortitude of amateurs at the 2021 U.S. Women’s Open, channeled that same resilience into his own game and won his first PGA Tour title at the 2022 WM Phoenix Open.
Carla’s 2025 ANWA win has already placed her among elite players. She became the fifth Spaniard to win at Augusta National, joining Seve Ballesteros, José María Olazábal, Sergio García, and Jon Rahm. But knowing that her winning moment quietly shaped McIlroy’s most historic one adds a chapter to her story that no one could have written in advance.
