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ABERDEEN ASSET MANAGEMENT SCOTTISH OPEN

July 5, 2016

Russell Knox

Inverness, Scotland

MICHAEL GIBBONS: Russell, thanks for joining us. Welcome home.

RUSSELL KNOX: Thank you very much. Great to be here. Raining as always.

MICHAEL GIBBONS: Just start us off with your thoughts on being home, I suppose.

RUSSELL KNOX: Yeah, just landed a few hours ago, so not really taken much in so far. But I mean, always nice to come home to Inverness. I mean, I can't wait to play this week. I've been looking forward to this for a long time. Probably four or five years to be honest.

Yeah, I'm excited. Hopefully I'll play well but if I don't, I'm going to enjoy myself either way. So look forward to it.

MICHAEL GIBBONS: How much support are you expecting?

RUSSELL KNOX: Yeah, hopefully lots. I know at least my parents and my sister will be here. I'm staying with a friend of mine, Matthew, and his parents, so there's at least five or six.

No, I look forward to it. I mean, I hope to see a lot of old friends that I haven't seen in a long time. Playing with McIlroy in The Irish Open; if I could get half the support that he received there in Ireland, I'd be thrilled. It would be an honour to get in the mix with a chance to win obviously. But either way, it's going to be incredible.

Q. A home OPEN in your hometown; are you pinching yourself?
RUSSELL KNOX: Yeah, absolutely. Growing up, my dad used to take us down to Gleneagles to watch The Scottish Open.

Yeah, I can't believe, this will be my third now I've played in, and getting to play here at Castle Stuart and Inverness is an unbelievable feeling.

I mean, it's crazy. The whole journey has been crazy the last couple years, and I mean, I just hope I never wake up and it keeps going.

Q. You talked about getting half the support that Rory McIlroy did at Irish Open; you're the home favourite and all the Scottish eyes will be on you. Is that something you feel you're ready for and you're ready to embrace, or is it something that maybe brings added pressure as well?
RUSSELL KNOX: Yeah, I guess we'll find out. Of course it adds a little bit of pressure, but I mean, we're used to it. Every week you've got pressure. I put a lot of pressure on myself every time I play, so I don't really feel added pressure. You go out, you play good or you play horrible. If you play horrible, the great thing about golf is you go on to the next week and hopefully you've figured something out.

Obviously I'll just try my best and hopefully have a smile on my face as I play here and hopefully it will make me play good.

Q. And is The Ryder Cup always in the back of your mind, as well? A few rookies possibly in the automatic qualification, so do you feel you have to play your way straight into that team rather than perhaps rely on a wildcard?
RUSSELL KNOX: Yeah, I think I've been thinking about it too much to be honest. After finishing second in Ireland, I maybe expected to keep going and play really good the next few weeks after that and it just didn't quite happen.

It's all to play for now. I have nothing to lose, everything to gain. If I play good this next month or so, I'm going to have a great chance to play my way on to the team or be right there for a potential pick.

I'm not really sure. I have to go and earn it. Everyone that makes the team has made their way on. I mean, they have deserved every second of being there. I felt like I played well. Obviously I got a victory, which was big. But I think I'm going to have to do more from now on to make the team, and I can't wait to try, and I sure hope I play well.

Q. The problem with coming home is that everybody knows you and everybody knows old stories; my cameraman used to pick you up to go to football training, and he also tells me you used to earn a fiver for fuel money. Good to be home, but you're home as Scotland's leading golfer and one of the favourites here this week. That's a different type of expectation on you. Is that one that you think you can get used to this week?
RUSSELL KNOX: Yeah, I'd better get used to it. I've been wanting to do this my whole life. I've been wanting to play on the PGA TOUR, The European Tour, all the majors, and hey, it's starting to happen.

I've been wanting to win tournaments and be in the Top-20, 10, in the world, as high as I can get. This is what I've been dreaming my whole life, and I'm not sure if you're ever really ready for it. You've just got to do your best and go for it.

Yeah, as the leading Scot, it would be great to obviously win this one. It would be one of the ones you would want to win most. I'll put everything into it and see what happens. But I'm not wanting to put extra pressure on myself. If it happens, it happens; if it doesn't, next year.

Q. I know you don't want to put pressure on yourself, but we then keep asking you questions. You know that a good week this week will really set you up for the home run for The Ryder Cup; is that what the focus is for the next two weeks is to almost deal with the tournaments as individual tournaments, but also knowing that it can get you a real launchpad into the final run?
RUSSELL KNOX: Yeah, I mean, every tournament is so important. Regardless of if I'm here in Europe or in the US, every tournament is massive. There's strong fields now wherever you play. If you can have that really good finish, try and win the tournament, or if you're right up there; people are watching and you're gaining World Ranking points, so every time you play is crucial to some kind of points list somewhere.

I wouldn't say one event is more important than any other one because they are all so big now, and every event matters.

Q. You just flew in this morning. Will you go out practicing today? And your approach to Castle Stuart, are you happy with what you know of the course, or will you be cramming in as much as possible before Thursday?
RUSSELL KNOX: I played here twice before. Last year I got a round in and a few years before that. To be honest, I don't know much about the course other than those two days I played, and I can probably remember half the holes. I'm sure when I get out there, I'll remember them all.

I might play today. I haven't decided yet. My last week's performance was pretty diabolical, so I might need to go do some practice.

But yeah, it's different for everyone. The tournament I won in China, I played one practice round, so I'll be able to play tomorrow in the Pro-Am. I'm not going to over-stress it. If I go out there and hit some balls and I feel energised to go play, I will. And if I play tired, I won't. It's not the end of the world to me. I'd rather save my energy for the four tournament days.

Q. Have you sorted out your driver issues yet?
RUSSELL KNOX: No. Open to suggestions is where I'm at.

Last week, I used a new one. I drove it okay to be honest. I hit some good ones and bad ones. But the trust issue is there. When you take out a new driver, you've never hit a meaningful shot with it before. Not like I was in contention last week; I mean, Firestone Country Club is probably the toughest driving course I've ever seen. I'm pretty positive this course will be a lot easier off the tee, from what I remember, so that will help.

But no, the goal is to get it sorted as soon as possible obviously, and it's taken longer than I would have liked for sure. But hopefully I'll get it started. I mean, if I can use David Lingmerth's backup driver, I should be able to find a driver. But it's proving a little harder than I thought.

I need to also not blame drivers for a "poor me" performance. I think professional golfers are great at that: Oh, it's the club, it's the club, I need to get a new shaft or whatever. But in reality, I've got to take more responsibility for poor driving. I'll get it figured out this week though.

Q. From your point of view, is there more pressure on you this week, or your dad, because he's competing at the Inverness Open, and apparently he's going to qualify for the knockout stages, and you won that.
RUSSELL KNOX: He's way more intense than I am at golf, so I know he's putting a lot of pressure on himself. So I would say definitely himself. Hopefully he can go on and do well.

Q. You're getting honest require I membership there on Thursday night, how special will that be for you?
RUSSELL KNOX: It will be. Especially my dad playing in the tournament, I look forward to going back there and seeing a lot of people that I haven't in a long time. That will be a good evening and hopefully I get to play early in the first day so that I can rest before I head out there, won't be a rush. But I look forward to that evening very much.

Q. You've had this meteoric rise over the last few years. How has that changed your life? For example, four years ago, where were you?
RUSSELL KNOX: Yeah, four years ago, I was probably on the Web.com tour. My life really hasn't changed to be honest. It's great to get into the PGA TOUR, the majors, the WGCs. My schedule has changed significantly. My life hasn't really changed at all. I got married two years ago. That's been great. We moved into a new house. All in all, my wife puts me in place pretty quickly if I get a little big-headed or whatever. She whacks me down.

Yeah, it's been an amazing journey. I hope the sky's the limit. I'm just trying to enjoy every minute of it, because like you know, golf is not forever. I hope I can have a long career, but if I don't, I mean, I know I've got at least three more coming, so that will be nice.

Q. You're well up the rankings and well inside the Top-50. Just speaking to Luke Donald, talking about how he was at the top of the rankings just a few years ago, but he's dropped way down now. Is the challenge for yourself to stay where you are or is it now to, you say you want to break into the Top 15, Top-10, Top-5, and how difficult a challenge is it with so many young golfers nowadays?
RUSSELL KNOX: Yeah, it's unbelievable how hard it is. Of course the goal is to stay inside the Top-50, but you have to play well to do it. Luke is a great player, and he's just one example of someone who has been at the top and slipped down. He's still a great player. It's so hard to stay there, and this is really my first go at trying to stay there and trying to move up.

To be honest, I don't know how I'm going to do. I could quite easily move forward or quite easily move back. That's the hard thing about golf is it's such a hard game. One week you feel like you're sure you're going to be up there to win the tournament and you can hit any shot, and then out comes a week like last week where you're like, am I even good enough to play golf.

It's such a hard game, and right when you think you kind of -- you're right there, you get sledgehammered. It's difficult. But I feel like I can keep improving. I know there's areas of my game I can improve on. I just have to figure out this whole traveling and playing in tournaments and getting more comfortable with all of this stuff and playing with bigger names.

I look forward to it. It's something I've always wanted and I'm going to relish the challenge.

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