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RICOH WOMEN'S BRITISH OPEN

July 28, 2015

Mo Martin

TRUMP TURNBERRY, SCOTLAND

COLIN CALLANDER: Good afternoon. I'd like to welcome Mo Martin, the defending champion. Must be great being back here and some nice memories, I would imagine.
MO MARTIN: Yeah, lots of memories coming back. It's fantastic to be Women's British Open champion and to have been announced that way for the last year. Yeah, lots of memories coming back, for sure. Not with the rain.
COLIN CALLANDER: Did you play today? When did you play for the first time? Will weather be a factor this week?
MO MARTIN: There were puddles, a lot of puddles, so the weather is definitely going to play a factor this week. We must have gotten a lot of rain overnight, so it was wet out there and it's coming down again here.
I've played 36 now, so I saw it for the first time yesterday. There are some beastly (ph) holes out there. It's going to be a challenge. I'm not entirely sure how the LGU will set it up being wet. It's not playing fairway to green‑‑ it's not particularly linksy right now, just because it's playing pretty soft. It's going to be in the hands of the LGU, how they set it up with the pin placements and tee boxes.

Q. Are you a good bad weather player?
MO MARTIN: Actually, I was thinking today in college, one of my best finishes was in horrendous weather. And so I think it keeps you in the moment. You have to have the correct attitude going into it for sure.
I mean, I think some players are out of it from the get‑go because they don't really want to be out there and they know they are kind of miserable on the first tee. So I think if you just have to have the mindset, it's going to be playing longer and it's going to be playing differently when the showers turn off and when they turn off.
And the wind can switch quite a bit out here. It completely turns the holes around. It's going to be a good challenge but I've played some very good rounds in bad weather.

Q. Would you say that you might prefer this weather to the sunshine?
MO MARTIN: Prefer this? I'm going to prefer whatever we have because I don't have a choice. Yes, right now, I'd prefer rain.

Q. What's been the biggest change or biggest bonus of being Women's British Open Champion?
MO MARTIN: There have been a lot of bonuses. On the tee box I get announced every week as the champion, and so that gets some extra roars. I feel like almost every time I'm at a tournament event, somebody talks about the shot, the 3‑wood, and how people‑‑ so many people said they were moved to tears and people talk about it being the greatest shot they have ever seen. So that's very cool.

Q. A few weeks ago, your fellow American, Zach Johnson, won The Open and he took home 1.15 million pounds. Whoever wins here this week and if you defend successfully, it will it be 235,000. Just wonder what your thoughts are in 2015 and the era of equality that we live in whether there is room for the ladies prize money to head some way towards the men's?
MO MARTIN: Well, taxes are going to hit both of those. So percentage‑wise, they are getting hit harder than we are. But yeah, there is a vast difference between the women's and the men's. That's pretty much in all sports except in tennis, I believe, is the only one that's pretty much equal right now.
But with our Commissioner, we've come a long way in the last few years, and the Tour right now is saturated with tournaments. So that speaks volumes from the product we're offering the sponsors, as well. Everybody is getting the message and we are going the right direction.

Q. Since you won last year, your thumbs‑‑
MO MARTIN: I have. I've actually been splinted now for about‑‑ well, the splint came on, let's see, probably eight months ago. I was injured oddly enough, I was hitting a 3‑wood on Sunday, the week after the British Open. And I felt searing pain through my thumbs and few doctors after that told me it was just a double‑jointed sprain.
And it took a third doctor and Mo Herman, a hand therapist in L.A. to get a proper diagnosis. And actually it was a different injury. There wasn't a very clear‑cut treatment plan for it. It's called dorsal impingement. The joint capsule got so inflamed that it collapsed into the joint and then my bone was pinching all these nerves, very painful.
For about four months, five months, I didn't know whether I was going to be able to swing again, pain a free. To have kind of hit the peak of the mountain and then to run into that, it was definitely a roller coaster.
But I'm splinted and I've been splinted now for a while. It's precautionary at this point and I'm playing pain‑free but I've had to change my grip, so that was another challenge on top of everything. It's been an interesting year and I'm just happy to be back playing and hitting it well and have the opportunity to defend here.

Q. Any surgical options?
MO MARTIN: It was no surgical options actually. So the treatment plan wasn't clear‑cut. Until we finally figured out what it was‑‑ actually, I cried when I heard there was not a surgical option. Not because I wanted surgery. Other than my teeth being removed, I've never had surgery and I don't want surgery. But I wanted an option whether it was the case here or down the road in a few years and I was still in pain.
It's a lot of physical therapy and fortunately it's gotten back in place with the help of a splint and hoping it stays that way.

Q. Am I right in thinking that you went to a baseball grip; is that right?
MO MARTIN: No. I started‑‑ well, I didn't start with a baseball grip. I went a couple years into my playing. I was pretty young and I have the ten‑finger grip. I started with it at a young age and I still have it. But what I did, I had a long thumb and I believe I went to that. It's not conventional but I went to that just to kind of have some unity in my grip just because it's further apart than normal. When I changed it, I had to get the pressure off my MT joint, which is this joint here.
So I had to shorten my thumb. When I first did it, it felt like I was holding a hockey stick. It didn't feel like there was any unity whatsoever. Right now I still have the ten‑finger grip, same thing. I just shortened my thumb. So my thumb is actually more in a traditional place right now than it was before.

Q. Switching gears completely, going to ask you about the Olympics, we're about 12 months away. You're a Major Champion but where would a Gold Medal rank compared to a major championship win?
MO MARTIN: That's a whole new level of achievement and one that we haven't had in our sport. So it would be amazing. I mean, tits definitely a different major and another major and it would be quite an honour if you add your country in on top of that, very neat.

Q. Did you ever think you might have to give up all together when you were injured?
MO MARTIN: I tried not to think that way but I did think because if it didn't get better‑‑ I mean, it was excruciating. As you can imagine, it was like a pinched disk, but in my left thumb. Up at the top of the swing, when I started to hinge, that's when I would start to feel the pain.
I'm pretty good with pain but I was calling it an 8 or a 9 out of 10; and at the top of my swing to feel that amount of pain, I couldn't continue doing that without some major change in my swing; and that affects your confidence.
Yeah, I wouldn't be able to do it. If I was in that pain, there's not a chance. I was trying not to think about it. I was trying to be optimistic. When I heard that there was not really a treatment plan and that there was no surgical option, I was pretty devastated at that point, especially coming off the momentum.
I was playing fantastic last year and I was in contention the week after; and then to have to back away and take two months off at that point, I didn't compete at Evian last year. I waited until the very last minute and I remember withdrawing from that tournament online maybe five minutes before the deadline. I was hoping it would just get better.

Q. Speaking about the Solheim Cup; do you think you could play two sessions in one day with your thumb?
MO MARTIN: I haven't had a problem with my thumb holding up. That was definitely a question at the beginning of the year, how many balls can I hit, how many range sessions, can I play a couple tournaments in a row, can I play four in a row. It has responded really well. I haven't had any setbacks. So, yes, I could definitely compete and play 36 holes in one day, especially playing two weeks in a row after that.
I've been thinking about it. It's not anything I can control. Clearly I don't want it to come down to a captain's pick because I've got no control over that. I'm going to play the best I can for the next couple events and we'll see what happens.

Q. Talking about the Olympics, that brings in a whole new level of things such as dope testing. Wonder if you would share with us where the LPGA is on that and any educational support the players are being given leading up to Rio next year?
MO MARTIN: We've been drug tested since I've been out here consistently. I actually remember the first time I was drug tested my rookie year. We were playing at Kingsmill. On No.18‑‑ I've gotten longer since then but I'm not the longest player on Tour. And I had a 5‑wood into that green, and I walked in and I think it was Stacy Lewis and Katherine Kirk, and they are both long‑ball strikers and they probably hit 8‑irons into that green. I walked in, I said, "I just hit a 5‑wood, do I need to be in here right now?" They thought it was funny.
No, they take the drug testing very seriously. I've been consistently tested. I think a lot of us are very leery of supplements and even vitamin waters. We're all very careful. It's nice that we've been under that structure. Granted, the Olympics, we can be tested at any point, so that will be different. They will be able to call us more at home and say, you're getting tested. But I definitely don't think doping is a problem out here.
COLIN CALLANDER: Thank you very much and good luck with your defence.

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