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PGA CHAMPIONSHIP

July 29, 2016

Jason Day

Springfield, New Jersey

Q. You put on some show there in the middle?
JASON DAY: I kind of gave myself a little bit of a kick in the bum, especially with the double bogey on 7. It was a bit of a mess there. With that said, being able to come back and birdie 8 and 9 really made things a lot better for me on the back side. Just kept on setting myself up for opportunities. Even when I was kind of out of position, either in a fairway bunker or just in the rough, I had perfect angles. So that was quite nice.

It was pretty receptive out there today. I think if you could be a little bit aggressive, but also play it safe on some of the holes that you needed to. If you had the putter rolling you could get a score going. Fortunately for me the back side was nice.

Q. You only played this course Wednesday when you arrived?
JASON DAY: Yes.

Q. For average golfers, can you explain how you can come onto a course you never played before like this and do what you did today?
JASON DAY: No, it's hard to explain it. I think there's a couple parts to it. Because I was a little bit sick at the start of the week and under the weather, so a lot of the expectation came down. I think being able to kind of voice where I'm at mentally and physically with my health takes a lot of expectations off my shoulders and lets everyone know that I don't have a lot of expectation coming to the week.

Also having Monday and Tuesday off, being able to rest and recover where some guys have come out -- I played with Rich Berberian on Wednesday and he was here since Saturday and it's been hot. So you can kind of wear yourself out.

I'm very lucky with this golf course because it's kind of all out in front of you. There's not a lot of tricks to it other than the mountain effect that can have on the greens. For the most part it's straightforward. We've come up with a game plan that kind of works. I played the practice round on Wednesday very quick. I didn't want to be in the sun too long.

From there, with the lower expectations and having a great back side today, kind of bolted me into contention. It's good to be in position, so I'm looking forward to the weekend.

Q. (No microphone)?
JASON DAY: Yeah, yeah. It's always good to be in contention at a major championship being that I won it last year it would be nice to get No. 2, my second major and get that under the belt. Right now I've got to focus on resting up tonight and be as patient as possible over the weekend. We may have delays, we might be coming in and out. Hopefully the storms miss us. If it does rain, you've got to be pretty aggressive. Once again, I think the game plan that I've had, give myself the opportunities and hole the putts from there.

Q. Did you feel like your presence on the leaderboard would affect those guy in fronts of you?
JASON DAY: I hope so. That would be nice. When guys are going to play good, they are going to play good. You look at Henrick and Phil at The Open Championship. They kind of ran away with it. Doesn't matter who you are. These guys are all good out here. They deserve the right to be here because of how they played. Anyone on any given week can play well.

For me to be able to keep putting myself on the top of the leaderboard, more so now than the last few weeks has definitely hopefully that helps a little bit. But I've just got to kind of inch my way slowly. Obviously I don't want to give the guys at the top some shots when I'm making silly errors. So I just try to inch my way back into the tournament that way.

Q. What is today's good stretch mean to you?
JASON DAY: If it was on a Sunday, it would be the best. But since it's on a Friday, it's just a good solid round. Getting myself in contention is where we want to be by Sunday and obviously playing and shooting 65 today is that one step closer.

Saturday is moving day, as everyone knows. If I can have a good one tomorrow, it will come down to the last day. So it's always exciting to be in contention. I'm super stoked about what happened today.

Q. Do you still think you left a little bit out there?
JASON DAY: Yeah, I parred 17 and 18 yesterday and did the exact same thing today. I was a little bit more conservative after the chip shot on 18, after seeing what Rory did. I didn't want to do that and give a shot back. So I made sure that I got it up there and gave myself an opportunity. The one on 17, if I birdied that, I was like stealing one really. I hit a terrible driver there and hooked it up in the grandstand, nice shot over the trees and hit a pretty good pitching wedge up near the hole. Unfortunately didn't hole that.

I said before, I'm just trying to save them for the weekend. If I can do that, that would be nice.

Q. What are the bullet points of this pep talk you gave yourself?
JASON DAY: A few swear words inside my head, like what are you doing. Just really I played that hole so bad that it was really frustrating for me. Why are you doing that? Why are you giving shots to the field when you don't need to do that? Be a little more aggressive on the second shot. Just play it out to the right. Don't do little silly errors like that and potentially give them two shots on that hole.

After that, I just said let's get it down the fairway, try to get it on the green, birdie the hole. I did that and then that kind of -- just try and birdie the next hole. From there, I really -- I had some momentum stoppage with the double bogey, but I once I birdied 8, the momentum started picking up and it picked up pretty quick. I felt good on the green, I had to get myself on the green and hole the putt. Fortunately I had a great back side.

Q. Where are you at physically?
JASON DAY: It's slowly getting better and better as the week goes on.

Q. (No microphone)?
JASON DAY: No, I'm pretty good. I'm feeling pretty good. I sweated it out over the last couple days. If we could have some nice, hot weather over the last few days that would be great. No excuses. Guys have won on worse. Tiger at the U.S. Open with a broken leg. I've got a cold. It's not the same. I'll be fine for the weekend.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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