Michael Stewart is desperate to seal Walker Cup selection

MICHAEL Stewart, the Scottish champion, is determined not to blow his Walker Cup chances for a second time by putting himself under too much pressure to make the Great Britain & Ireland side to face the Americans at Royal Aberdeen in September.

Speaking as he jetted out to South Africa yesterday for an eight-week trip with fellow members of the Scotland elite squad, the 20-year-old Ayrshire amateur is aiming to learn some valuable lessons from his bid to make the team for the last match in the biennial encounter.

"Two years ago I put a lot of pressure on myself to get into the Walker Cup and that effectively made me perform poorer than if I hadn't been thinking about it.

"Last year I put the Eisenhower Trophy to the back of my mind. I was just playing golf, which is the goal this year," said Stewart.

The same ten players who spent a month in the Middle East before Christmas have made the trip to South Africa, where they will play in five events as well as practising at some of the country's leading facilities.

"This winter I've made a lot of changes to my swing, just to become more consistent in the long term, and I'll be able to perform week in week out at a higher level if I do make these changes," added Stewart, one of four Scots in the GB&I squad for the Walker Cup.

"You need to take the chance to work on your short game and we'll be taking advantage of the conditions in South Africa to do that." Beyond the Walker Cup, which he says is "a huge goal", Stewart has his sights set on the European Tour Qualifying School at the end of the year and says time in the company of Stephen Gallacher and Steven O'Hara in recent weeks will prove helpful when that comes around. "My main target this year is the Tour School. That's what I want to try to peak for and the session we had with Stephen Gallacher recently at Kingsfield was great. He was very open about everything, his plans, what he's done on the Tour. O'Hara is the same and it's great knowing these guys are there if you need them. I have done a lot of travelling since I've been 15, 16. I've been lucky enough to play in big events and in front of a lot of people. But when you're playing for your livelihood you never know how you are going to do. It's different from playing for a team. It's what kind of pressures you put on yourself."