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THE PLAYERS CHAMPIONSHIP MEDIA CONFERENCEMarch 19, 2007Stephen AmesCHRIS REIMER: I want to first start off by welcoming all the media we have here locally in Ponte Vedra and also those of us joining us on the AT & T conference call. At this point we want to welcome 2006 PLAYERS Champion Stephen Ames. Congratulations, and obviously let's just go ahead and get some comments looking back at your victory now. What do you remember and what does it mean to be the 2006 PLAYERS Champion? STEPHEN AMES: Well, obviously it's a good memory for me for the fact of the way I played on Sunday, and also the fact of being recognized as what we call the fifth major, winning that. Other than the majors themselves, it's the biggest event on TOUR that you can possibly win. Obviously good memories and a good result for me. Q. You just got back from doing some interviews on the 17th hole. You drove by the clubhouse. What were your impressions of the course and the clubhouse out there? STEPHEN AMES: The golf course looks the same. I think we've got a couple of new tees. I this I we've added like 200 yards overall to the golf course, and some good changes, too, things that needed to be done overall. The clubhouse obviously is going to be the biggest change for the whole TPC area, Sawgrass I should say, overall. Your first view is like, wow, finally we got rid of that clubhouse that we had, which was a little outdated; back in the '70s it was built. Overall I think it's a great change for the club and for us as our Players Club. Q. You talked about changes that were made to the golf course. Could you give us some detail? STEPHEN AMES: Some of the holes were getting a little short in some senses, but I think -- so they moved a couple tees back. The 1st hole, you can see that's moved back; 16 has gone back; I think 8 has maybe got back a little further; maybe 14. Those were the ones that they had changed. I think they are good changes. If we are playing at this time of year I think they would be too long, but now that we are playing in May the course is going to be running a little more. I think overall the course isn't going to be as long but it's going to be even more difficult now. Some of the greens, some of the slopes have been taken out from what I've been told, so we can use some of the greens, even utilize some of the pin spots where probably in the past we have not been able to utilize. So overall they're changes but not unfair changes, which is good. Q. You've been in contention a lot this year, including this week at Bay Hill. Do you think winning THE PLAYERS had a role in some of that? STEPHEN AMES: Obviously, yeah. It's given me the confidence that I know that I have the ability to be able to compete against the best in the world, week in and week out. That's what we all try to do basically, to be consistent as much as we can, anytime we tee it up. Q. You talked a little bit about the changes to the golf course. Obviously there was length added to some tees, but talk about the changes to the soil and changes to the fairways. It's going to make it run firmer and faster. What does that mean from a player's point of view? What do you see as the change to the golf course itself? STEPHEN AMES: I think overall the general public don't realize that when we play a firmer, faster golf course, the fairways that are 25 and 30 yards wide all of a sudden become half that because you miss a shot, any kind of curve on the ball, right to left or left to right, if it doesn't keep -- it's not going to keep to the fairway because it's running; rather than the one that's spinning and running out and landing on the soft fairway, it's not going to run into the rough. So that's what makes a difficult golf course difficult to play when it's firm and fast like that. Some events -- I tend to pick the ones that tend to be firm and fast to play. I'm not a big fan of the West Coast because of the fact that it's always wet there and your missed shot doesn't run and doesn't run into the trouble, so you tend to be -- it tends to be a little wider in other words, so there's not too much of a premium on accuracy all of a sudden. This golf course, the way it's built to run, you have to shape your golf ball off the tee, and being fast and firm as it's going to be in May coming, it's going to be even tougher to hit the fairways. I think overall the venue itself, it's changed, and the scoring is going to be even higher in May when it comes here if it doesn't rain. I think it's just going to be even more of a challenge for us come May. Q. The more accurate player will have more of a chance? STEPHEN AMES: I wouldn't say more of a chance. I mean, I'm an average hitter. Definitely Fred Funk is an average hitter. I think more premium is going to be put on the fact of -- I'm going to be hitting 3-woods off the tee, Tiger and Vijay and those guys are going to be hitting irons off the tee. I think there's going to be more of a premium on ball-striking, which to my recollection it's always been the guy that hits the most fairways, most greens, makes the putts is the one that wins, not the one that's scrambling around on the golf course, week in and week out. That becomes more premium, and the same for the U.S. Open, The Masters, any majors, the guys who hits it the best is usually the one that wins, and this event is going to be recognized as that even more now. Q. Talk about in 2002, talk about last year winning and how that was a breakthrough and really 2002 was really more of a breakthrough because even though you were runner-up here in 2002 that started the ball really rolling for your career after that and you became winner of one tournament and then got to the point last year where you did win the big one here. STEPHEN AMES: Probably 2002 is when I started to mature, yeah (laughter), as a person, more than anything else, just getting to know myself, the golf courses that we were playing, being in the heat of the battle. Obviously as a player you want to be in the heat itself and see how you react to being in those situations. That just gave me the experience. I mean, I didn't have the experience playing in the heat all the time during college golf, so I had to learn that playing on the European Tour and then learn it playing on this TOUR, as well. It's just a matter of time, experience-wise. I'm what they call a late bloomer because I didn't have the opportunities like most of these kids have here in North America to play competition week in and week out through college or university. Just an experience. Gave it time and eventually came through. Q. How tough was it after that to come back and -- what was maybe the biggest thing you took from that? STEPHEN AMES: I don't know, I actually think about 2002, 2003, 2004 was a breakthrough year for me there. 2004 I think there was a couple things that came into light with the fact that I found a psychologist that helped me mentally to get me out of the rut that I was in, which was playing golf swing and not playing golf, which I had the ability to do. And then of course Robert being on the bag with me, too, that helped, from 2004. The three years have been really good for me, two big wins I had, the Western Open, finishing eighth on the Money List, 26th on the Money List last year. Good golf, golf that I knew and I've been told in the past that I'm capable of playing. Just a matter of me, like I said, getting out of my own way, which is not easy to do. Q. Preparation-wise for you, anything different going in as a champion this year? STEPHEN AMES: No, the same basically. We're going to come here and play -- the good thing about playing this event, the majors and the World Golf Championships, we don't have the Pro-Am on the Wednesday, so I would play Monday nine holes, Tuesday nine holes and Wednesday pick which of the nine is most difficult to play, so I'll play nine holes every day and slowly prepare myself because it's a long week. All those weeks are long weeks and the golf course beats you up because of how difficult the play is, and you want to be physically and mentally relaxed and prepared but not physically drained out from doing all the extra practice that you don't really need because you've seen it so many times before. That won't change. Q. Is Robert going to caddie for you? STEPHEN AMES: No, he's not caddying anymore. He's playing now. Q. Can you project on tournament day walking onto the first tee as defending champion? Do you think there will be anything different than a normal week? STEPHEN AMES: No, not at all. It's always nice every time you go to an event and you tee it up, "We have the 2006 PLAYERS Champion Stephen Ames," that's a nice ring (laughter). You don't want to be playing with Tiger. "He's won this one, this one..." You're like, "Okay, that's enough." I think Phil did that one year. He said to the guy, "Okay, that's enough, let's play." It's kind of funny. Q. Since the tournament moved here, nobody has ever won it back to back. Could you do it and what would it take? STEPHEN AMES: It's going to be a different golf course, a completely different course for everybody coming in May. Obviously the biggest event on Tour you want to play well, so we're going to prepare ourselves for that when the times comes, but no, I can't predict that. If I could I wouldn't be here; I would be home playing the lottery every week (laughing). Q. I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about what happened on Saturday night? I don't know if you were eating spinach or what you were doing, but you seemed like you came out Sunday definitely with a lot of confidence, particularly in your game, and that's question number one. Question number two, I was wondering if you could talk about -- you talked about confidence earlier in the year, and I think particularly at the time of THE PLAYERS Championship last year you were coming off a pretty rough year obviously with some personal difficulties in your family, and I was just wondering if that was kind of the thing that turned it around for you, whether you were wondering if you would ever get back to where you were, especially after you did so well the year before. STEPHEN AMES: Yeah, okay. Saturday night, what did I do Saturday night? Nothing actually. I think I had a massage Saturday night or Saturday afternoon. And then I went out for dinner. Actually I went out for dinner with my brother is what it was. It was just a relaxing evening, typically week in, week out like I normally have. I think we tend to stay a little bit out of the limelight and dealing with people. That night was very relaxing as normal. You know, after the year I had in 2004, I was looking forward to 2005, and prior to coming to Augusta is when we found out that Jodi had lung cancer and she had to go for the operation. From April onwards, it was like I was playing on a different planet, obviously because of the fact that you're worried about your wife, you're not sure where your career is going to be heading to in the sense of if you're going to have a wife to be looking after your kids or whether you're going to have to do something else. All those things went through my mind obviously. But to the extent, I would say when the Canadian Open came around, which was September of 2005, was the first time I felt like I was playing golf again. So it took me roughly eight to nine months before I realized how what we call very foggy in the sense of mind-wise where I was. Playing from that time on, from then, from April until September, I felt, like I said, I had been on a different planet, and it was difficult, very difficult, to focus. So 2005 was literally a washout for me in that sense. Q. I was just wondering how you're feeling health-wise. Obviously you had some back trouble at the end of last year, and is that behind you now and are you feeling strong and good? STEPHEN AMES: I am actually. I've changed a few things in my swing to stop it. The main reason that it went out was because of my golf swing, and I had to change that itself. I've added in a few things at home in Calgary that are helping me out, as well, a few more people, I should say, to help me out there. I've been really good. I've been practicing harder than I normally have this time of year, and I haven't had any recurrences or any kind of tightness or uncomfortableness at all, so it's been really good, and I feel very strong, yeah, thank you. Q. Just wanted to check in, we're doing some stuff not so much for today but for later on, on Tiger, as he chases Jack's record. With some of us anyway, you look at the way he's played the last few years and despite the distractions he still seems to keep marching along. Do you feel the inevitable that he's going to be overtaking Jack's record in the majors? STEPHEN AMES: Well, I'm sure he will be. Q. You just can't see anything really stopping him? STEPHEN AMES: Well, the players probably -- some of the players are going to try to stop him, but I don't think it's the players that need to stop him. It's going to be Tiger that's going to stop himself. I think he's going to do it, it's just a matter of when he's going to do it. Probably the next ten years, yeah, he'll probably pass it easily. Q. We were talking last week at Bay Hill about some of the swing changes you're making with Sean [Foley], and I'm just wondering how your experience at Bay Hill was, looked like that ball came up short on Saturday and you were getting in contention. How they held up, that's number one. And number two, you've always struggled with, as you said before, between golf swing and playing golf, and you're working on some swing changes. Are you able to drop the swing changes, stop thinking about them on Thursday morning and just go play golf? STEPHEN AMES: That's been tough. Actually this week was probably the turning point for me for getting rid of swing feelings of working on the golf swing and sticking with just playing golf. Sean and I devised a plan on how to go about doing that. This weekend the quality shots that I hit were much better. There were things that I've been looking for, for obviously a divot pattern. You always see it in the divots, in the dirt. For me this week I saw some things that I have not seen or haven't seen ever in my golf swing and obviously in the divots, and those are good things for me. It was a nice turn this week. I would say the quality shots that I hit this week were really quality wise and feeling wise, and it was just tough at Bay Hill this week overall to be able to play golf, trying not to play golf swing. I think overall I'm very happy with the direction I'm heading into and feel good about this week, the World Golf Championships coming up, and obviously the rest of the year. CHRIS REIMER: Thanks, everyone, for joining us here on the line, and Stephen, we appreciate you coming in. End of FastScripts |
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