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WACHOVIA CHAMPIONSHIP

May 6, 2004

Mike Weir

CHARLOTTE, NORTH CAROLINA

CHRIS REIMER: Mike Weir, round of 67, nine birdies in today's round. Did you see nine birdies out there? During the practice rounds, did you see opportunities on the course?

MIKE WEIR: Not really, although we did have perfect conditions this morning. There was no wind. The greens were fairly soft, as soft as they're going to be this week. I got off to a great start and made five birdies in my first seven holes. Made a nice putt on No. 10, which is the hole I started on, maybe 15, 18 feet. Outside of that, I had it close, inside of eight feet from the next four. And then misclubbed a little bit on 17 and hit it a little bit heavy and it went in the water on 17 and in the water on 18 and made bogey, and pulled it right on No. 2 and made another bogey. The momentum I had was kind of evaporating.

I told myself to keep hanging in there, it's a long week. I birdied the par 5 from right in front of the green, and then knocked -- I had about a 15-footer for eagle on 7. And hit it four feet on 8 and 9. It was a great way to finish, considering the way I finished my back side, my first nine, it was good to finish on a good note.

Q. How did you refocus after your front nine?

MIKE WEIR: It's hard to, sometimes. I think I just feel refreshed because I've been off the last three weeks and I think when you're grinding and playing a bunch of weeks in a row, you might not respond as well. I feel refreshed mentally, I didn't let it bother me. I kept telling myself, look, it's Thursday, don't let this thing get away from me, and I was able to do it.

Q. (Inaudible)?

MIKE WEIR: Not necessarily. I don't think so. It felt like a great tournament last year. It had a great atmosphere about it. It was a great field last year and the golf course was set up very difficult. The rough this year is just a little bit, I would say, a little spottier, in that you could get a decent enough lie in the rough to maybe go at the green, where last year it seemed if you hit it in there you had no chance.

There's still -- I would say 70 percent of the time you hit it in the rough out here now, you are going to have no chance, but there is a little chance that you might actually get something to be able to play. The setup of the golf course, as difficult as it is, just makes for a great atmosphere, along with the field.

Q. Given what you did out there today and some of the other scores that are posted, I know the conditions are going to get tougher when the greens bake, but 10-under won the tournament last year. Is it going to take 15 or something else this year?

MIKE WEIR: It all depends on the weather, if the wind picks up. The wind is kind of down right now. When the wind blows out here, it seems to swirl around quite a bit. I noticed today, what little wind there was, you hit a tee shot down there, you think it was downwind, you hit your approach shot and it was blowing in the opposite direction. It plays difficult, the wind around here. If it picks up, I suspect, still around 12 to 14ish, will be a real good number at the end of the week.

Q. (Inaudible)?

MIKE WEIR: If I would have been a bunch under par and finished like I did on the other side, it would be tougher going to the range and sleeping on it, waiting until 1:00 to get back out there. It will make it a little bit easier to wait around tomorrow for 1:00. Sometimes it is tougher when you finish poorly compared to finishing well.

Q. (Inaudible)?

MIKE WEIR: The thing I was really disappointed with, I knew it was maybe one more club, but I was swinging so well, I was 5 under, I thought I could hit a really good 5 on 17, even though it was a just little bit into the wind, and I mis-hit it enough that the wind -- it didn't have a penetrating enough flight and the wind knocked it down and it rolled into the water. I should have hit the other club. I was just disappointed that I kind of knew that in my mind. I should have hit the other one and played the safe shot. Sometimes when you get on a roll and you're making a lot of birdies, you think you're going to stiff it every time. You live and learn.

Q. (Inaudible)?

MIKE WEIR: I would say maybe a little bit surprised, but just because I've been off since the Masters and off the last three weeks, but I've been working really hard. I didn't play very well at THE PLAYERS Championship, Atlanta or Augusta, I was a little bit frustrated, needed the time off to work with my coach a little bit, and time away from the game to assess what was going on with my swing, and I think we got is it ironed out pretty good, and it hopefully will get better as the week goes on.

Q. What were you working on in those three weeks?

MIKE WEIR: I pretty much had my schedule up to the Masters, so I hadn't planned anything forward of that. I may have played -- if I wasn't playing so poorly, I would have played one of those events in there, Hilton Head or something, because I like that golf course. I just needed time to work on my game, work on my fundamentals, my grip and ball position, all of those things just kind of got out of whack a little bit, so I just went to work on those things.

Q. Regarding Tiger Woods, amongst us in the media and many people analyzing his game and overanalyzing his game, is it he in a slump, is he not? It seems whenever he is challenged, his history is he generally comes back strong and proves everybody wrong that there was no slump. Are you among those that expect him to start a flurry, whether it's U.S. Open time or this week or whatever?

MIKE WEIR: I can only speak for myself. I know how difficult the game is. It has peaks and valleys and no one is excluded from that. But he will respond, I mean, he has too much talent, he has too solid of a golf swing and too efficient of a golf swing, he's bound to start playing well. I'm sure he's not that far off. He's a competitor. He's not going to back down and he's going to work on his game hard to get back to where he was.

Q. You talked about the weather, and tomorrow you've got a later tee time, obviously the rain from the past weekend is going to start drying out and there's sun for the rest of the weekend. How much more difficult is that going to make tomorrow's round? And do you think that scores maybe will go up tomorrow and going into the weekend?

MIKE WEIR: Yes, I mentioned that earlier as I came in. The sun is nice and warm out there today, a little bit of wind. The course will continue to play more difficult as the week goes on. Whenever we play a challenging golf course like this and such a good tournament like this, the staff does such a good job to make the golf course just a little more difficult every day, and I suspect that's going to happen here.

Q. (Inaudible)?

MIKE WEIR: No, I didn't make any long putts. The longest putt I made was first hole, No. 10, and that was 18 feet. And like I said, my other birdies were -- after that I birdied the par 3, 13, and that was probably about 15 feet.

And the next hole was about eight feet. The next hole was about four feet. The next hole was about eight feet. So those were the five birdies I made on that side.

And then on the front side, the first par 5, which is the 5th hole, I was right in front of the green, chipped it three feet.

And 7 is a par 5, like I said, I had 15 feet for eagle and left it right in the middle short, made birdie there.

8, I hit it four feet. And 9, I hit it four feet. I just happened to dial in some iron shots today.

Q. (Inaudible)?

MIKE WEIR: It's okay. It's taken a little bit of the strategy away from the hole. You rip driver down there and you're left with a little angled wedge into the green. Where last year it seems like the fairway had a little more slope to it, and you had to decide whether you wanted to hit driver up and get it way up there, because then the green sloped away from you, or you wanted to lay it back and leave yourself a fuller shot. I think time will tell with that green. We'll see at the end of the week how it plays out. From my mind, I think the strategy of the hole is a little bit missing there.

Q. How did you find the greens today? Were they a little slower today and what do you think it will be like by Sunday?

MIKE WEIR: The greens will be softer as the week goes on. Above the hole they are still very fast. I think uphill in the morning with a little bit of due in the greens, they were a little bit slow, but as the sun came out and got warmer, they sped up a little bit. But as the week goes on, yes, they will get much faster.

CHRIS REIMER: Thanks, Mike.

End of FastScripts.

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