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RBC CANADIAN OPEN

July 21, 2016

Jason Day

Oakville, Ontario, Canada

JASON DAY: It's a little tough with how dry everything is, it's almost better to get up there around the greens with a wedge in your hand. You miss the fairway with an iron off the tee, there's no chance of you keeping it on green anyway. You may as well get it up close to the green and try and hit it up in the air and keep it there.

The greens were pretty fast. They are pretty firm and fast. I think the boys this afternoon are going to probably hopefully not complain too much about them.

Q. I thought the whole golf course was playing fast with the wind coming up. Hard to pick a club?
JASON DAY: Yeah, it was. We had a southwesterly today, and got a few cross-breeze shots but for the most part, it was pretty steady on the front nine. Kind of died down a little bit but it's still there. So you've just got to hit it on the right breeze. You've got to time your shot perfectly. If you don't, it's short of the hole and then you're trying to scramble and save yourself par.

Q. Talk about your round today and how you found the golf course?
JASON DAY: It was good. Just a couple of areas on the back side, which is my front. I felt pretty good about my game overall. Just another unforced error here on 7 but for the most part, put myself in good position on 8 and 9 and unfortunately didn't take advantage of it.

But for the most part, it's a pretty solid opening round. I think the greens are going to be a little bit baked this afternoon. Should make it very, very difficult for the guys that are teeing off this afternoon. We are going to get the exact same thing tomorrow. But yeah, we'll see how it goes. I'm looking forward to sitting down and watching some golf.

Q. How fast are the fairways running up there?
JASON DAY: It's not as much as you think. You hit the right brown spot, and it runs. You hit a lush spot, it actually stops. If you hit it in the rough, that's where they are starting to bounce, because if it's brown on both sides, you hit in the rough, it's gone another 50 yards, which is not a bad thing.

I think overall, if I'm going to try and hit an iron in play, and I miss the fairway, you're pretty much done. There's no chance of keeping it on the green. My mentality is to get it up there as far as I can. If I can drive it straight, get it up somewhere around the green; my miss it, I have a wedge in my hand, I can get it somewhere on the green.

Q. Is that a different mentality than last year, No. 9 --
JASON DAY: Not last year, but since it's baked out a little bit, there's not a lot of grass down there. You don't get the great contact and great flight that you get from the fairway, but it's no easy second shot from the middle of that fairway there. It has changed a little bit but for the most part, I hit a lot of drivers last year, too.

Q. Talk about the eagle on 2 and how key that was to put you right in contention again.
JASON DAY: Yeah, I was kind of disappointed that I parred 18 and then didn't really -- the MoJo was kind of not there. Hit a great drive down 2. Hit a pretty decent second shot but kind of pulled up short. I watched Ernie hit a great shot from the right-side bunker trap. I hit my shot and I think I got little unlucky but got lucky as well hitting the flag. That kind of got my momentum going back. I nearly holed a great putt on 3 from 40 or 50 feet and then birdied 4.

Overall, very pleased. I'm happy with how the opening round went.

Q. 69 in the first round, with an eagle and four birdies, a really good start and yet still seemed as if at times the golf course confused you a bit. How did the golf course surprise you?
JASON DAY: Yeah, it's very dry out there. So the game plan for me has kind of changed a little bit, trying to hit driver as far as I can to get close to the green. If you try and lay up and hit it into the rough, there's no chance of stopping it on the green with how firm everything is.

I'm just trying to get as close as I can to the greens. If I miss a fairway then I've got a wedge in my hand. Hopefully I can stop it with a wedge in my hand. But for the most part, I felt like played okay. I didn't hit a ton of greens today but I kind of missed in the right spots.

Q. You talked about the firm greens; how does that make you change the way you play? You hit your irons high but you're still making some adjustment?
JASON DAY: For me, I think I'm one of the higher ball hitters out here, and I found it difficult to stop. We're hitting some wedge shots, trying to run them up the front of the greens or trying to hit it 20, 30, 40 feet away from the pin location just to get it on the greens and get a putt across to it.

It's definitely a premium on hitting a lot of greens this week but it's more so if you can hit the fairways, that gives you the opportunity to hit the greens. You don't hit the fairways, you're pretty much done.

Q. 69, nice start, but getting pretty firm and fast out there, wasn't it?
JASON DAY: It's pretty warm out here right now. It's probably the hardest I've played up here. You can tell by the course how firm and fast it is. You hit a drive down the middle and you get it on the right brown spot, it's going forever. If you hit it in the rough and you hit the brown spots, they just keep running. Obviously it's a premium on hitting fairways. It really is difficult to try and get any sort of score going when you're playing out of the rough here.

Q. Were you trying to work on your short game on 8 and 9?
JASON DAY: Yeah, I know, I crushed a drive down there on 8. Really puzzled me. I put a new 60 in last week, especially with all the sand, obviously the way that it was bouncing last week. It was going about 97 yards. I went down there and I had 104 yards into eight and went, this is perfect, and hit it and it came up short, and puzzled me, and then did the same thing on 9.

I did that again yesterday, as well, so the 60 is not quite going the distance that I'm looking for. Unfortunately I was in two scoring opportunities there and lucky enough to get away with two pars there.

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