THE MEMORIAL TOURNAMENT

May 24, 2000

Vijay Singh

VIJAY SINGH: Last year was really good, except I didn't win (laughs). But I've always played well, here. I've loved this golf course. I love the changes. 7th hole is different. 6th hole is different. 5th hole is altogether different on the green-side. All for the better I think. The golf course is going to play a lot tougher. A lot of pressure put on your irons play will be really important. Some of the greens have gotten smaller. As usual, it's raining here again, but the golf course is in great shape and I'm really looking forward to it.

VIJAY SINGH: I wasn't in there much, too. So -- it's so wet, the golf course. Even if the ball is heading towards the rough, it doesn't really get in there because it stops almost immediately. But I think if you hit in there you're going to have some problems getting out of there. Bluegrass is really hard to play. The fairways feel so good, just don't want to leave the fairways right now. But I think the fairways are so generous, it will be hard -- you have to hit a really bad shot to get into the rough.

VIJAY SINGH: Pretty good. My whole game is shaping up. I'm hitting my driver really good. The iron play has been good for a while now. Must be the irons I'm using. That's what they keep telling me. But I'm hitting my irons really, really good, and all I need to do is make some putts right now. And the greens are probably the best I've ever seen the greens here. If you get the ball in line you're going to have a good chance of making putts.

VIJAY SINGH: Very much. There's a lot of holes where you cannot be above the hole. If you're above the hole six or eight feet, you have you'll be lagging your putt, where if you're below the hole, you've got a good chance of making a putt.

VIJAY SINGH: I think so. I mean, also, there's a lot of holes over here, if you hit it a long ways off the tee and go into the rough, you're not going to be going with so much of a long iron. I think there's more chances of missing the fairway here on a par 5 than you do on the par 4s, so that way, you can always have a decent shot to the greens. 7th hole, for instance, if you hit it off-line there on a par 5, you're trying to hit it as long as possible. And that's the only time we're going to let it loose, and that's the times where you hit it in the rough. 11 is the same thing. 5th hole is the same thing. Mostly the par 5 is where we're going to see the long hitters missing fairways here. And around the greens, the rough is very strong. If you miss the greens over here, you're going to have a hard time getting up-and-down.

VIJAY SINGH: Augusta has been a little more active -- mostly the signing of autographs and people. Wherever I go, there's a lot of signing to do. And a lot of Augusta flags. I don't know how many I've signed there, but it's really kind of a non-ending thing. But besides that, I've been pretty -- pretty well received everywhere I went. You know a little more demand from you guys.

VIJAY SINGH: I little bit more louder. More people kind of watching my group now. But it's a lot more -- congrats from everybody wherever I go, "Well done, at the Masters," than of the PGA. PGA, they kind of forgot after a little while.

VIJAY SINGH: I don't know. I think the PGA was the last tournament, the last major of the year, and you wait so long before the first one comes, the Masters is the first one and you've got the whole season to kind of, you know, look up to that. And I think that's why. You know, the next one is another month away, so from the Masters to the U.S. Open, there's a big gap, too. So that's probably why.

VIJAY SINGH: That's a fair comment. There's a lot of great players that won only one major. I think to the player, it makes a lot more -- deal if you win twice than if you do just once, but I think winning one is almost as hard as winning two. I don't quite believe in that.

VIJAY SINGH: I think that's his plan, yeah.

VIJAY SINGH: Yeah, I have. He's come over here and he wants to try and see how he's going to do over here. He's been playing in Asia and Australia for a while. I just hope he goes out and plays well. He's been practicing quite a bit and working with a guy called Peter Kroger (phonetic) in Tampa. I haven't seen him in a month now.

VIJAY SINGH: He's 39.

VIJAY SINGH: He's been a pro for a while, about ten years, I think. He's a pretty decent player, but, you know, I just hope -- he hasn't played in that many tournaments where he's played well in. He's played a lot of tournaments in Asia, but nothing big.

VIJAY SINGH: I think so. He's lengthened the 7th hole a little bit, which is one of the ones that he's made a little longer. But it's an advantage to the long hitter, if there's any wind -- if you can't get up, you're going to get as close to the green as possible. Most of the guys are going to lay up. He's made the greens small, too, like the 5th hole, he made a big change to the 5th hole. Now you cannot -- you if miss it to the left side, you're going to be in the water. So again, it's a big advantage to the longer hitters. So whatever changes he did, I think it's better for the longer hitters on the par 5s. So I think it's to our advantage.

VIJAY SINGH: A lot of people have talked about it, winning the whole -- the four of them. You know, I've won to two now. But, you know Pebble, I've always played well on Pebble. And I love the golf course. There's something about Pebble, and it's great design, but then the beauty of the surroundings, you haven't got a better setting than Pebble Beach. And to play well there and win -- I've seen a lot of U.S. Opens, played in Pebble, where Jack won his tournament, Watson and Tom Kite, and, you know, I've seen it so many times on videos about those tournaments. So going over there this year will be in a befitting setting to go out there and play well. I'm playing well and looking forward to it. But it's a golf course where every player right now, in the Top-10, has played well in the past, so I think it's going to be one hell of an Open. And then going to St. Andrews, you know, the history is just unbelievable. Last one I played there when John Daly won, I had a chance to win there, as well. So St. Andrews is kind of unique in the sense that it's a great golf course when the wind blows. If the wind blows, it's one of the hardest golf courses you can play. But then when the wind doesn't blow, the scoring will be very, very low. I mean you can see in the Dunhill Cup, most of the time, when it's benign, 62s, 63s are shot there almost every time when there's no wind. So St. Andrews is going to be an Open Championship where you're going to really -- the conditions are going to dictate the whole tournament, how you are going to play.

VIJAY SINGH: I think so. I think that's going to test our ability to its limits. It's a golf course where you need the wind to blow to make it an interesting -- it was designed that way. So I don't want it to be a hurricane, but I want it to blow a little bit.

VIJAY SINGH: Well, I remember the article that came out about Tom Weiskopf was in 1977 when he was in Golf Digest, they had a whole sequence of him. I picked out -- that was the first article where I saw a sequence of photos. And I was a fairly tall guy when I was growing up, or I was to them -- but my dad always said, there's no point in you going out and emulating somebody who is a short guy. You've got to kind of pick out somebody who is tall and swings -- you know, that's the way you're going to swing the golf club. And Tom Weiskopf was a great example. And it so happened that the article came out, and I kept it for a long, long time.

VIJAY SINGH: I think so. You've got to score on the first four holes. I don't believe the 5th hole is a birdie opportunity there, or if the wind blows. And the 7th hole, I remember -- when we played AT&T this year, I hit a 5-iron in there, you know. So that's -- to a green that is 100 yards away and hitting a 5-iron, that's not a birdie opportunity. So I think the first four holes you see -- well, now they made the 2nd hole into a par 5; that takes that away. I think there's only three holes in the first four where you can actually have a good birdie opportunity. But if the wind doesn't blow, all of them are. I think 8, 9 and 10 are never easy holes in Pebble. If you hit a good drive, you've got to -- the greens look so small in the distance, especially the 8th hole. I think if I play 8, 9 and 10 in the tournament in 2-over, for the whole tournament, or 3-over, for that matter, I think I'll -- everybody is going to take that. Those three holes are probably the hardest stretch of holes in any given day in any tournament. So to get through those three would be really the key factor. And then the rest of them -- 17 is never going to be easy to the pin, from the tee going all the way back. Just have to wait and see how we play. Once we go out there, just have to focus on each hole at a time and try not to think too far ahead. I think that's what we have to do out there.

VIJAY SINGH: They are unbelievable. Yesterday I played in the rain a lot, and I said, "Well, it couldn't have rained that much, because the greens are just unbelievably firm and releasing." I was out here yesterday and the rain we had -- and I hit my first shot, I had a 9-iron on the first shot. It was so high and still released about six yards. So unless you're hitting in with sand wedge or wedges, the greens are just -- I've never seen the greens with so much rain play so good. So that's a tribute to the guys who built it.

VIJAY SINGH: You just have to deal with it the best you can. I don't see that it is affecting my focus at all or my concentration, but I'm not spending too much time standing in one area and signing. I'll just keep walking. If I have a lot of time and there's not too many of them, I'll try to do everything I can. You just have to focus and see how your time is. Like today from tee-to-green or green-to-tee, it was -- there are a lot of people out there lined up, you know for autographs, so just take one, keep walking, and get the most you can. But on the focus side, I don't think it's made any difference to me.

VIJAY SINGH: Well, we knew who Jack was, you know. He's known everywhere in the world, what he's done in the game of golf. But, you know if you go and ask somebody in Fiji, you know, if you pick any name out here, they probably won't know, but they will know who Jack is, they will obviously know who he is. That's a name that you relate golf to, I guess and it's been like that forever.

VIJAY SINGH: I think at the British Open. It was in the 90s when I played. I actually first met him at Troon. I think it was the early 90s. He was hitting balls on the range. That's the first time I ever met him. He was there until almost dark and hitting these wooden drivers, and his son was there and he was hitting drivers into the wind. And he kept hitting one good and one bad, and he said he cannot leave without hitting two good ones in a row. So I kind of took that -- that kind of tip that you must finish off with two good shots. And I remember Jack from then on, that whenever he would finish, he must hit two good shots before he finished. And that's such a good thought that I kept forever. And that's the first time I met Jack.

VIJAY SINGH: Well, it's a good thought. Anybody can hit one good one.

VIJAY SINGH: I never discussed the golf swing, but I played at Peter Jacobson's tournament quite a while ago and he was my partner. We had a great time together. And I think I played -- Jack was paired with -- I think his son. We had a great time; although, we didn't play very well. But it was a nice memory to have.

VIJAY SINGH: I think he knew that. He still swings it beautifully. Just one of the best golf swings I've ever seen. Just nice to play and know he's the guy you looked up to growing up or still do.

VIJAY SINGH: I still practice a lot. For a while I've been swinging the club so well that I don't need to spend so much time. I've spent hours and hours trying to get my golf swing where it is now, and now when I feel that I'm swinging it the way I want to, I don't need to go out there and spend six, eight hours trying to keep doing what I'm doing good. So I more or less focus more on my short game now, towards my putting. I'm spending a little bit more time on my putting. But if I need to, I'll spend a lot of time on the range, yeah.

VIJAY SINGH: I not behaving well.

VIJAY SINGH: I haven't played with the same Dandy all the way through. I changed at Byron Nelson. I changed the puttered; played one Dandy and went back to -- kind of going back and forth.

VIJAY SINGH: Well, today I'm going to finish here and probably go and hit balls for an hour. Literally hit balls out there, and then work on my short game for maybe another hour and leave. But when I'm at home, I go on the range, maybe around 9 o'clock, 9:30, you know. Do a little chipping, whatever, and then go and hit balls for probably an hour and a half. And then, you know, there's always friends around; so you chat with them a little bit. Hit a few more balls and putt a little bit. Just around there, you just -- kind of hang-out time, you know. And have some lunch, go back out there, mess around a bit more, and all of the sudden it's about 3:00 or 4:00. See, if a guy comes out there and watches me go to the range and said, well, he's just going to the range at 9:00 and he leaves and I'm still on the range, wow, he's been there all day hitting balls. So it's really not spending six hours hitting balls. It's just kind of hitting balls.

VIJAY SINGH: I'm thinking about it, but I haven't really made up my mind yet. Maybe in the near future.

VIJAY SINGH: I don't know. The way I've been putting, I think really I should do it. But I'm not reading the greens as good as I think I should be. But I'm quite comfortable with this right now. If I do it, it's going to be a spur of the moment deal.