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SENIOR PGA CHAMPIONSHIP PRESENTED BY KITCHENAIDMay 20, 2015Fred FunkFRENCH LICK, INDIANA JULIUS MASON: Ladies and gentlemen, we would like to welcome Fred Funk to the media center in French Lick at the Senior PGA Championship. Nice tie for third finish at the Allianz Championship this year. Fred, how is your game? FRED FUNK: Well, I got a season that I didn't really look, have any foresight that I was going to be injured again. I was feeling really good prior to Boca event and then that Tuesday I was practicing to go down and I developed tennis elbow so bad I couldn't grip the club. And I had a cortisone shot that Tuesday and I played, I finished third, and then went out to -- I was in the -- instead of going to Naples, I went on to Pebble Beach, I was in that event based on the money I made at Mayacoba earlier in the fall. And really looking forward to it, Pebble Beach is my favorite golf course. Played one round over MPCC and I had to fly home. I couldn't even hold the club. I shut it down for three months, I had all the therapists, everything was not working. And then all the doctors had a different opinion. I went down Olin Browne told me about this machine in Jupiter that this guy has called a magnetic pulse thing and I went down there and spent 10 days with him and went from not being able to hold that bottle to chipping and then hitting 7-irons 10 days later. A few weeks later I tried to play and I played at Atlanta and then a team event and last week. It's getting better. Not near the pain I used to have in it. It's very functional. So, I'm really fortunate that I'm playing and thankful that I'm playing, because I really was not enjoying being home. So, I played really good last week, I showed signs of playing some really, really good golf in stretches. And then I had a bad Sunday. That was disappointing. But still finished ninth and on another golf course I really like, Shoal Creek is fantastic. But really excited just to be playing pretty good and coming -- the fact that I'm playing, number one, I'm playing pretty decent and we're coming into our Major season, where we have I think in nine weeks all five of our Major, I think, so it's a good time to be playing well, that's for sure. I'm excited about that. JULIUS MASON: So let me get this straight. You finished ninth at the Major Championship last week and you're not 100 percent healthy. FRED FUNK: Not even close. I haven't been able to practice much. I kind of shut it down after 30 or 40 or 50 balls. Trying to spend a little more time with the short game, but I've been really struggling with the putter as much time as I've been spending with it. But, yeah, I'm not where I need to be physically. But a lot better than I was even a month ago. Even a month ago I was really struggling. So, I feel real fortunate that I'm here in that regard. JULIUS MASON: So you're playing in your seventh Senior PGA Championship, your best finish in this event was a tie for five in 2009. FRED FUNK: Where was that? JULIUS MASON: 2009 where were we? FRED FUNK: Was that -- JULIUS MASON: Canterberry, Ohio. FRED FUNK: Yeah, I love that golf course. That was a good one. That was my best finish? Ninth? Okay. I thought I did better somewhere. JULIUS MASON: What do you think about the golf course here? FRED FUNK: I have a really good record on Pete Dye golf courses. I won THE PLAYERS, I won at Crooked Stick. Two of Pete Dye's gems. I like Whistling Straights. What he does and what he though throws at you with all the visual intimidation is typical. You got to -- you got to basically just suck it up and hit the shots. With this golf course, it's even more so. This is I think the most demanding -- one of the most demanding courses I've ever played. I think off the tee it's narrow, I love it for my game. If I'm playing well and I'm driving the ball the way I'm capable of, the way I usually do, then it will play into my hands. But if you're a little bit off, whether it's with the driver and especially with the second shot into these greens, it just magnifies your problems. I think to the point of extreme. But everybody's got to deal with it and that will -- no question in my mind, the guy that's playing the best this week, controls his emotions the best, and is really hitting on as many cylinders as possible, with his game, he's going to win this tournament. You cannot fake your way around this golf course. There will be no one in the -- I think you have a hard time making the cut here if you're not really playing well, much less getting into and staying in contention. I think it's a high anxiety golf course. I think that when you're going out there if you feel really good about your game, then, yeah, you can probably have a lot of confidence and there's always guys in the field that are just doing everything perfect. But to do it four days in a row, you're going to have to get through some tough situations. I think the key to this golf course is going to be not only controlling your golf ball, but trying to minimize more than bogeys. Try to, when you make a boo-boo, try to make your bogey or lucky to make par, but don't try to make your doubles and triples, try to avoid those because you can easily get in a position that you're just so out of position that you can get back into position easy enough to even save a bogey. There's a lot of stuff out there. It's visually intimidating and it's physically intimidating all at the same time. To the point that I've never seen -- I always -- you got room at TPC, you got room at Crooked Stick. Here, the misses are just seem to be really magnified here. With the green complexes and the way some of the fairways, all the trouble off the fairway. And if you happen to get a bad bounce and you end up in that uncut hay, that's over on the sides, it's so thick, if you find it, you can't even move it. So, that could be a big issue too. I hate to be so negative, but I'm -- look out there at like hole 13 could be a huge back up, if you get a situation where a couple guys or one guy hits it off that mowed part on the bank on the left over the bunker and it just hops down into the hay. You could be there a long time. You're going to have to decide whether you're going to have to go back and re-tee or try to hack it out of there. And it's just going to be a big issue. So, it's a very difficult golf course, I love Pete Dye's work, this one's just a tough whom Bray here. It's tough. JULIUS MASON: Questions? Q. After saying all that, Pete's famous quote about not building a fair golf course, is this golf course as close to unfair as you can get it? FRED FUNK: Well, I hate to say anything's unfair, because everybody's got to play it. So it's not unfair. You really got to hit -- it just magnifies your mistakes to the point where you could be a little off on -- another example is on 15, that left side of 15. It's a very -- it's 454 yards or something, the fairways are not rolling yet. It's probably going, we're going to get good enough weather they're going to start rolling out. Hopefully we get good weather, until Sunday I heard anyway it's supposed to be really good. So I think we'll start getting a little run on the ball, it might play a little bit shorter or should play a little bit shorter, but if you have that back pin and you go for that back pin and you breathe on it left, which I did in the first day practice round, I was down in this little drainage ditch that's just before the cart or maintenance road that's down there and it's not marked, I had nothing. If it happens to get out of that ditch and goes across, then you're in that hay that's about that deep (Indicating) and you have nothing. So there's just a lot of situations where you would not have a shot. If you want to say that's unfair, yeah, I just think that you got the best players in the world age 50 and over coming here and it's going to be a real challenge for us. And with that being said, we're playing it at what are we playing? 7,100? 7,100 yards or so. Which is what we average when we play a Champions Tour event. They got another thousand yards they could go back. If they wanted to. I think one day it would be kind of fun if we just said oh the heck with it, let's just do the back pins and 8,100 yards and see what the average score would be. Just do one day of that and see how many guys would finish. Q. The course record is 71 from there. FRED FUNK: From 8,100 yards? That's a phenomenal record. There would be half the holes I wouldn't be able to reach. I would be wearing out 3-woods and 3-irons and everything else. But, yeah, he created, he created a diabolical golf course. This is, I think the hardest golf course I've ever played. And I loved it. The first day I went out and I was hitting the ball really good, I played nine holes Monday afternoon, and I hit every fairway, I missed that 15th green, and I drove it in the crap on the hole before that on 14th par-5 I think it is. That wasn't the par-5. 16. 16, I drove it in the crap. And other than that, I played extremely good. And I said this is perfect for me. Then I went out in the pro-am yesterday and it was cold, or colder, cool, and a little bit more wind, and I wasn't playing very well, I never got loose and I wasn't playing very well and I was like, geez, this thing just keeps coming after you every hole. And I made one birdie, I was trying as hard as can I on every shot, and I made one birdie and I think I managed to make four bogeys. And keep it at four bogeys. So that's 75. And I didn't play good, but I was trying to keep everything in front of me to see what I could shoot. So, I think it's going to be one of those courses you're going to see a lot of big scores, you're going to see a huge separation from the guys that are playing good and the guys that are not playing good, which is fine. I love that. I love four round tournaments. I love the fact that we have a cut in a big field. I love the history of this event. It's going to be really interesting how this course plays out with the way they will set it up and everything else. Because the greens are hard to putt, too, you can get in the wrong spot on the green and they're hard to 2-putt. I found that out yesterday on a couple holes. I was on the wrong side and had a big tier to come down and it just -- you had to hit perfect putts to get close. So it's going to be one heck of a test and I'm probably the most negative guy you've heard all morning up here, but I just am telling you, it's just going to be interesting. JULIUS MASON: If you shoot a 63 in the first round tomorrow. FRED FUNK: If I shoot 63 I'm still going to be coming in here negative. (Laughter.) Q. With a course like this and knowing there's big numbers around the corner possibly and knowing that it's four days and not three, does it become even more of a mental battle than normal? FRED FUNK: Yeah, this course is a big mental battle. You're going to hit it -- you're going to have stretches in four days or in each individual round where you're just not going to be where you want to be. You just got to figure out how to minimize the damage and not carry that over to the next hole, because you get on a bogey train here, that's a freight train. That thing, it could just keep coming at you. So, you just got to really persevere. A guy with Bernhard's mentality, somehow he keeps everything that happened before out and moves forward, at least he appears that way. He breaks you with his physical game, but he breaks you and beats you with his mental game as well. The guys with the mental game here are going to have a big advantage. I'm really working on mine right now. Not right here at this moment, but I'm working on my mental game. (Laughter.) Q. You need a more positive mindset. FRED FUNK: Yeah, I'm going to call Rotella because right now I'm positive about my negativity. So, but I told Rotella that when I went to the couch, I says, I'm positive about my negativity. He goes, oh, boy, we got issues. But no, I look forward to it as far as the challenge and everything. I'm just hopping I'm playing really good. I think it's a golf course that's perfect for me if I'm playing well. I just got to play like I did Monday afternoon and not like I did yesterday. It was fun Monday afternoon. I was knocking the flag down and I made four birdies the first -- I birdied 10, 11, 12, 13, right out of the gate. And my longest putt was six feet. I went, shoot, this is easy. And then it hit the fan a couple holes later and I found out that this course isn't so easy, because I started hitting it where I didn't want to be. And the problem is you can't get -- it's hard to get your self back into position. That's the thing. So, if you call that unfair, that's the tough part. I mean that's where you can draw the line where you can recover from a bad shot, a lot of golf courses -- unless you're in the water or something, that's obvious, you can't there, but some of these places you just can't. And he does that on purpose. Obviously, that's his theme. I don't know what other guys have thought about comparing this one to all other Pete Dye works, I talked it Pete Dye the other night at the draw party and we're not friends because I don't know him that well, but acquaintances by any means, and told him how much I love his golf courses and Crooked Stick where he lives and TPC have been great tournaments for me and great venues. But I was talking to him about 13, the par-5, the first par-5. Oh, 12. I'm sorry. 12. That dogleg left. So, if you lay up straight ahead on the top, that's where all the balls are going to be. Or if you happen to have to lay up and you decide to take a little more off and you're in that first little whoop-dee-do, all the balls feed to the both top and it creates this divot farm. I said, well, Pete, you know No. 12, I said, would you, did you ever consider how much we're going to have a divot farm at the two layup areas on 12? He goes, well that's okay. And I go, okay. I didn't have anywhere to go with that. So, and then yesterday we're playing a scramble so now you got five guys or at least four of the guys, the amateurs they're all hitting in this one spot and just digging trenches with this turf being so soft. So you're creating a lot more divots in one little area because of the format yesterday. And there I go, I'm criticizing the format now. But, boy, I'm fun, aren't I? (Laughter.) Any other questions? (Laughter.) JULIUS MASON: We're going to be out there watching you on 12. FRED FUNK: No, no, no, don't watch me on 12. JULIUS MASON: 1:20 tomorrow? Grouping with Ian Woosnam and Rocco Mediate. Do you like that? FRED FUNK: Yeah, I got one guy I'm taller than and one guy that talks more than I do. (Laughter.) Not many guys I'm taller than out here. But Woosie is a great friend and Rocco is a stitch. He's fun to play with. And the combination of he and his caddie Martin, and their banter back and forth is really fun. They bring a lot of energy to the group. I'm really proud of Woosie for winning that tournament. He almost won the team event and then where did he win? At Houston and won Insperity and I knew how much it meant to win the team when he and Sandy were right in position to win it going into Sunday, because he doesn't really have status, the European Tour players don't have the status out here, unless you're a Hall of Fame guy. They don't have the career money. And then he goes and wins the next tournament and all of a sudden he has status. That's really cool. So it was great for Woosie and he's going to be a great asset to our TOUR. He's a great guy. Great player. So that's really good. JULIUS MASON: We hope you get as close to 100 percent as possible this next couple of days. FRED FUNK: Thanks. I'm going to work on everything. (Laughter.) JULIUS MASON: Thanks for coming in. FRED FUNK: All right. Thanks. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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