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PUERTO RICO OPENMarch 5, 2015Chris SmithRIO GRANDE, PUERTO RICO Q. Just tell me about your round today. CHRIS SMITH: I played really good, actually. I made‑‑ I hit it in the bunker‑‑ you know, it's obviously windy, and it's early. And I hit it in the bunker on the first hole, and I hit it up there real close and saved par, and then after that it was pretty easy. Hit it in the water on 13, made a really good bogey there, and then other than that, I was in good shape. I made bogey on 15 also, but I was right in front of the green where I wanted to be and didn't get it up and down, but I played good. I made a lot of birdies. I putted pretty good. I hit the ball pretty good, and I had fun. Q. Yes. This wind today is pretty brutal. CHRIS SMITH: Yeah. It was super windy. I was up super early this morning, actually, and it was still dark out, and I was out walking around, trying to wake up and warm up at 3:45 this morning, and it was howling at 3:45, and I was like, what in the heck. But yeah, I think it's going to be like that all week, so it's okay. Q. What do you like about the course? CHRIS SMITH: You know, I've always played pretty well here. I think the course has a lot of character. I think it has some long holes, and it's got some short holes, and if you hit it good and make some putts, you can shoot some decent scores, but if you hit bad shots, you get penalized. And it's a nice walk. It's flat. The surroundings are really good. So I don't know. I've always come here and felt pretty good and played halfway decent. Q. What do you like about coming to Puerto Rico to play as far as where we are, in a bit of paradise? CHRIS SMITH: Well, at home it's like 15 below right now, so I really like the fact that it's 80 degrees, and you know, I don't really venture out a lot when I'm here, because everything is kind of contained here on property, and so I think that makes it easy, and I think it's‑‑ you kind of know what you're going to get every year when you come here, and the golf course is always in good shape, and people are always friendly. They're always happy to have us. So I mean the combination of the time of the year and how nice the weather is and the fact that it's just a nice place to come, I look forward to it every year. Q. Can you talk a little bit about the field? You see young guys. You see some older guys, lots of guys that you've played with for many years. CHRIS SMITH: Yeah. I think it's great. Like a lot of my really good friends now are playing on the Champions Tour. So you know, here and used to be down at Mayakoba, you would see some guys like that, and it's not so much anymore, so this is one of the few times out here where you do see Rocco. I hadn't seen Rocco for a long time, and I saw Lee a lot last year. But Skip Kendall, Joe Durant, Steve Lowery, I mean there's a bunch of them out here, which is really fun, and then you also have a bunch of the really young kids that are younger than my daughter that are trying to find their way, too. They talked about it a little bit. I was watching the preview yesterday on TV, and they were talking about how it's kind of a‑‑ it's a really neat field because you have a little bit of everything, and I'm sure you'd be able to tell me the age range, but I'm guessing there's‑‑ I'm guessing there's gotta be 35 years of difference between the youngest and oldest. Q. Yeah. The youngest is 17, amateur playing. CHRIS SMITH: Oh, we have a 17‑year‑old, so it's more than that. So I mean I think it's good for all of us to see each other, and I think it's important to have these tournaments where, you know, you can kind of get everybody a shot to play and you can have a field that's a little bit more diverse. And everybody is‑‑ you know, it's a really important tournament for everybody that's here, which is unique in itself, too, because everybody here is trying to either get back to, you know, a level that they were at or they're trying to find a level that they've never been to. So it's a fun week. Q. You played some fall events and Web.com. What else has been going on? CHRIS SMITH: Not much. I played‑‑ I can't get into any Web.com events anymore, which is really a bummer, but I did get in Mississippi, and I played pretty good at Mississippi, and then I played at Pebble and I didn't play very well at Pebble, and I think a lot of that was I hadn't played for three months because the weather had been really bad. You know, I just‑‑ I've tried to prepare for my chances and try to stay somewhat sharp, and I hit balls indoors at home, and then when I get out, I try to enjoy the whole process and have a nice walk and be thankful that I have the opportunity to do what I do. Q. How often have you been playing? CHRIS SMITH: Not much. Not much at all. I practiced last week, and that was about it. I was out at Pebble, and I practiced the weekend leading up to Pebble. And so I mean no kidding, in the last three months I've‑‑ I don't know. I've probably played 15 or 18 rounds in the last three and a half months. Q. So you said you consider that you played well today, obviously. So how do you assess playing so little and then coming out here today, in these conditions? CHRIS SMITH: Well, this is my 19th year out here, so I mean if I don't have it figured out at this point‑‑ I mean I've been playing since I was four. You know, I think the biggest problem when you don't play a lot is you come out and overthink it and try to work on mechanics and try to do things like that when I've been doing this forever. So if I just came and tried to get my timing and my rhythm and tried to keep it realistic of what I was doing, I felt like I would do okay, and I think I was much better at that today than I was at Pebble where I was like, okay, I'm not working on mechanics; I've done this my whole life. I'm going to stand on the first tee and have fun and trust what I've been doing for the last 40 years. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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