Argos stint helps Jack McDonald catalogue winning formula on Tartan Pro Tour

Anyone spotting Jack McDonald in the Prestwick branch of Argos on Wednesday morning could have been forgiven for thinking that he was treating himself.

After all, he’d freshly landed his second £4,000 pay-day in the space of a fortnight through a brace of impressive wins on Paul Lawrie’s Tartan Pro Tour at Blairgowrie and Royal Dornoch.

The Argos uniform he was wearing, though, would have been an indication that he was actually working there and not scanning the catalogues for himself or anyone else.

“I’ve done it since last November - the week after the PGA EuroPro Tour Grand Final at Slaley Hall, in fact - and I’ve really enjoyed it, to be honest,” McDonald told The Scotsman at the end of his shift.

That had started at 8am, meaning he only grabbed a few hours sleep following a four-and-a-half journey down from Sutherland to his native Ayrshire on Tuesday after a late finish in the Royal Dornoch Masters.

Carding rounds of 66 and 65 for a nine-under total, the 29-year-old claimed a one-shot victory over Kieran Cantley, having already won the season-opening Blairgowrie Perthshire Masters in a play-off two weeks earlier.

McDonald will be giving up that job in Argos in a few weeks’ time as the EuroPro Tour starts its new season and the Challenge Tour also cranks up, but it’s been helpful to him and not just in terms of paying bills over the winter.

“It’s been good to do something else other than just playing golf,” he said. “It has taught me how to manage my time better because you have to go and practice around your work. It’s given me structure to my days, which I feel has helped me a lot.

“Eight hours, for example, is a long time in a day to fill in when you are not working and, when I have been practising, I feel as if