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THE 147TH OPEN

July 22, 2018

Jordan Spieth

Angus, Scotland, United Kingdom

Q. How are you feeling?
JORDAN SPIETH: I feel fine. I mean, I've already gone through the frustration. I'm kind of on acceptance now.

Q. What's that involve, breaking something?
JORDAN SPIETH: No. No, I'm fine. When you put yourself in position enough times, it goes your way sometimes, it doesn't go your way sometimes. Obviously frustrated with hitting a couple of iron shots in bunkers. I felt like I had really good control of the ball. I didn't play the wind the right way on those two holes. I was trying to fight it instead of accepting that the wind is going to win out here. So those two bogeys kind of hurt.

Then obviously, No. 6, I could have played a mid iron to the middle of the fairway, but I was trying to take the burn out of the equation by hitting 3 wood to carry it. It was unlucky. It went into the only bush that's over on the right side. If it misses it, I hit the green and have a birdie putt.

Q. (Inaudible).
JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, look at my thumb. I cut it a little bit.

Q. Did it go inside your thumbnail?
JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, a little bit inside the thumbnail. But someone found it, which was nice. That saved me -- well, probably ended up breaking even because I tried to rip the putt.

Yeah, it was going to be a tough day. It was going to be tough to hold fairways. You knew you'd have three, four good looks at birdies, and the rest of the holes, you were just going to try to position it to make par. I knew that going in. I played patiently. I put good swings on it. Never got down on myself. Never got angry. Man, I just didn't make a putt today. I hit really good putts too. My stroke is there. It's back, which feels awesome.

And my game all together is back. I've had different parts of every single part of my game being at kind of a low point in my career, not all at the same time, but enough to where I haven't really been able to compete. It's all there, and it's moving in the right direction. So I'm actually very pleased coming out of this week.

Obviously, with the disappointment of not getting the job done today, but I'm not going to win every single time.

Q. I know you said you weren't going to look at the leaderboard today, but at some point did you notice that Tiger had taken the lead?
JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, I saw it on maybe No. 7 or 8 green, and it was on accident. And I looked up, and I saw Tiger at No. 1, and he was leading solo, and I went to Michael, I was like, "Dammit, I looked at the board, dude." I was like frustrated at myself. He's like, "He hasn't been in this position in ten years, and you've been here how many times in the last three years." He was like throwing it back at me. I was like, I feel fine. It's okay. This is what you dream about anyway.

So hit some good shots from there. Just we got put on the clock, and I actually got a bad time. I felt like I played really quickly today. Xander had a lot of flies on his ball, and we had a couple different rulings, he and I, and it put us behind. I really rushed the 10th and 11th holes when we were being timed, including a bad time on the 11th tee. And it kind of -- I handled it okay, but looking back, you know, that was a turning point in the round. If you get 1-under on those two holes with a downwind par 5 left, you know, it's a different story.

Q. Did you deserve it?
JORDAN SPIETH: I don't -- I took over the allotted time on the tee on 11 to decide on 3 iron or 3 wood, but throughout the day, I think I played the fastest golf I've probably ever played while contending in a tournament.

Q. When did you get put on the clock exactly?
JORDAN SPIETH: I don't remember. It was sometime around -- they told us to speed up, and they told us maybe off No. 9 tee box, "We have to time you," or 10. I can't remember exactly.

Q. Is the last year going to help you a lot going forward, going through everything you went through, trying to figure it out?
JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, I think -- I believe that my best golf has yet to come, absolutely. Even better than '15, all that, yeah. I believe that going through struggles, you start to realise where your tendencies are and how to -- you know, how to compensate for it and turn them into advantages. I think that I have that going for me.

This golf course in general, I knew coming in that it's probably the worst for me in the rotation, just given where my misses are, and the way the last few -- so I'm not making excuses for myself by any means because all I had to do is shoot even par today, and I could certainly do that out here. But today it showed you on the greens that I felt like I hit great putts and missed them from everywhere, and I just don't do that when I'm hitting good putts. Just misreads, and I just couldn't get it to the hole. It's so hard to hit it that hard, and they're so flat. I'm an imaginative putter, very feel putter. You just almost have to be ding, ding, you know, straight lines. It's weird.

Q. Do you feel like you'll have to deal with Tiger now for quite a number of years?
JORDAN SPIETH: I don't know if deal with him is -- we get to have him competing week in and week out, I think. So yeah.

Q. So this is real?
JORDAN SPIETH: Absolutely. Yeah, this wasn't a fluke. I think we've seen that throughout the year. And he wouldn't tell you, but he's human, and experiencing those kind of -- that kind of pressure that he would have felt leading The Open on a Sunday is no different than anybody else, especially being that -- having not experienced it for so long. He obviously has good memories to draw on, but that was something he'll come back stronger from for sure.

Q. You talk about drawing good memories. You lost the lead last year in the final round and then came back. Did you try to use that before, like you've been here before?
JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah. Like I said, I never got down on myself. I was still in the driver's seat. I wasn't comparing myself to Xander. I wasn't comparing myself to any of the roars or anything. I was strictly focused on the shot at hand. I probably had the best -- I felt the best coming into today and throughout the round felt the most comfortable that I've felt at a Sunday in a major in my life, in all reality. It just simply didn't go my way, mainly because I just didn't make anything.

Q. Were the green speeds different today comparatively?
JORDAN SPIETH: They slowed it up a little because of the wind. But in general, they were just flat, slower greens. And that's -- they had to be, right, today? They did what they need to do. They stuck pins in really tough locations. I thought the R&A did a fantastic job. It's was an amazing Open Championship. For me, it's frustrating, man, when I'm like, this putt has to be outside the hole, has to be outside the hole. It just doesn't break. I'm like how many times this week. But it happens.

Q. Did you think Xander was going to win there for a while?
JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah. Because I thought Xander on 16 tee, I go, "Mikey, what's going on now." And he's like, "Xander's the guy. I think you need to make one on the last three," is what he said. And he hits it pretty close there. I thought, makes that putt, and it's over. But then I saw Francesco over there hit it close on 18 and walked up and saw that that was to get to 8. At that point, my day was done.

Q. When you hear that Francesco went 37 holes without a bogey --
JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, just to go today's round without a bogey is unreal. Yesterday wasn't hard not to make a bogey. (Laughter).

Q. Speak for yourself.
JORDAN SPIETH: But today was pretty ridiculous. He's been playing unbelievable golf. He's been working his butt off. I see him in the gym all the time, going through his routine, grinding on the range, doing his own stuff. It truly is hard work that paid off for Francesco. I'm certainly happy for him. I've watched this through the PGA Tour this year day in and day out, seeing him work as hard as anyone else.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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