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RBC CANADIAN OPEN

July 24, 2018

Troy Merritt

Oakville, Ontario, Canada

JOHN BUSH: We'd like to welcome Troy Merritt into the interview room. He is making his 7th career start at the RBC Canadian Open, with a T-32 in 2016, his best finish. Troy, first of all, a comment about being back in Canada this week?

TROY MERRITT: It's always nice to come up to Canada. We've played several great events up here. Glen Abbey is one of my favorites, so it's a course that rewards a little bit of more aggressive play, especially coming down the stretch. You can make a lot of birdies coming down the stretch, maybe an Eagle in there. There's always high drama in this golf tournament on this golf course. I don't think this week will be any different.

I haven't had a chance to fully look at the weather. I'm still trying to dry out from last week in Kentucky. But I love this event. I really enjoy coming up here.

JOHN BUSH: Speaking of last week, you survived last week, survived a jam-packed leaderboard to win for the second time on the PGA TOUR, and also weather conditions. It was a challenging week. Just comment on winning once again?

TROY MERRITT: Yeah, it was kind of funny. I got in late Monday night. I was in a Pro-Am, the Rockford Pro-Am in Illinois, and when I got in Monday night into Tuesday morning, I was thinking it's going to feel like a short week. By the time we were done yesterday, it didn't feel like we were ever going to leave Kentucky, which wasn't a bad thing. I really enjoyed Lexington. But, yeah, the weather really was a dominant factor last week. That golf course would be a lot of fun to play it when it's firmer and drier.

But it wasn't the case. I think they said they had over five inches of rain during the tournament, and it showed. But the golf course held up great. The grounds crew did an absolutely phenomenal job. The greens rolled really well still even with how much rain they had. I really enjoyed the area. I enjoyed the people at Barbasol, the people at Keene Trace, and really enjoyed picking up my second win there.

JOHN BUSH: Before questions, you're really set up now to make a run with the FedExCup playoffs coming up. Just comment a little bit about how this changes your goals?

TROY MERRITT: Yeah, it's nice to change the mindset from how am I going to finish top 125 and keep my card and get to the playoffs, to now, what do I need to do to get to East Lake, and then the Tour Championship? So I'm going to play this week. I'm not going to play next week, and then we'll tee it up again at the PGA.

So really hoping to have a good week this week, and another good week at the PGA, and having a rest week before going to the playoffs because I'd really like to get to East Lake. I never made it to the Tour Championship, and that's become a realistic possibility now.

Q. Just explain the last 24 hours and what everything has been like? Because a Monday finish means more eyeballs watching, and I'm sure that you must have been exhausted, but a lot of people commented on your patience to get through that week. So what have the last 24 hours been like? Mentally exhausting, I'm sure?
TROY MERRITT: I feel a lot better than I did after my first win at the Quicken Loans. I learned after that one, I stayed up all night answering messages and ended up watching the rerun of the tournament on the Golf Channel, and I was shot. I was wiped for the whole week in Akron, and I didn't feel right until Saturday. As a result, I finished last place. I didn't play very well. It was kind of nice finishing the tournament. I think I finished around noon, 12:30, something like that. And having the rest of the day then to take care of messages and just kind of relax.

But Sunday was an off day for me. I didn't hit one competitive shot. I had a full warm-up for an hour before they shut us down at 7:30 that night.

But it's just been, you know, it was a lot of good, solid, patient golf like you said on Sunday. My caddie, Wayne, did a great job of keeping us in the moment, and it was a lot of fun to be able to answer all the messages afterwards. I had something over 200 text messages, and it took me six, seven hours to get through messages, not only personal, but also going through social media and responding a little bit.

It's been a lot of fun. I got up early this morning to come up to Canada, and I'm happy to be here.

Q. Anybody like super random reach out to you to congratulate you?
TROY MERRITT: I think I got the customary tweet from Gary Player. He usually sends his best wishes to everybody. But a guy that I played Monday after the Masters with several years ago, Detlef Schrempf, the NBA player, he keeps in touch via email, and we play from time to time. It was nice to have him reach out too. He was paying attention.

Q. Obviously, some very solid results this season, but certainly the win, what was the big difference for you last week to kind of put you over the hump and nod to victory?
TROY MERRITT: I think we found out on Thursday was the third time I shot 10-under par in a PGA TOUR event, and the other two I won one and tied for third in the other. Now I have another win. So if I can go out and shoot 10-under par in one of my rounds, two-thirds of the time I've gone on to win. But my main focus, and talked to Wayne about this after Memphis, weekends haven't been very good. Made a majority of my cuts this year, which isn't normal for my career.

But the weekends I've really stalled out, and we were trying to figure out what that was. It kind of came down to more of a mental approach. Trying to get too many shots back at once, and ultimately giving shots away.

So just going back to the basics, one shot at a time, focus on what we're doing now, and add them up at the end. It really helped out this last weekend.

Q. With this potentially being the last open here at the Abbey, is there any specific memories or anything that comes to mind when you think about this golf course throughout the years?
TROY MERRITT: I just always dread that 11th tee shot. I really like the golf course, and it's the shot that's most memorable to me because it's the one that I'm most uncomfortable with. Like I said, I really enjoyed the finish here. The last six holes are great fun. Three par fives, a short par-3, you have a chance to make a lot of birdies, maybe throw in an eagle and provide a lot of drama.

So if we go away from here, I think that's what I'll miss most, besides not having hit that 11th tee shot.

Q. Congrats on the win, Troy. Playing at Glen Abbey this week, what is going to be the most important facet of your game that you're going to need to watch and look at if you're going to have success at this tournament?
TROY MERRITT: Yeah, I think it's going to be building on what I've been working on the last few months. It's just a nice, steady, consistent play. Don't get ahead of myself. Just know that the golf game that I have is the one that I have, and it's still good enough to win on the tour. Evidenced, yesterday. It's just going to be staying in the moment and focusing on not trying to do too much. You're going to make a lot of birdies this week. This course usually yields birdies, except for that one year when it was really dry and windy. It was tough that year. But just staying in the moment. That's got to be the key going forward.

Q. How do you prepare for the challenge of the 18th hole, and how do you weigh the risk-reward factors of it?
TROY MERRITT: Yeah, that one for me is all conditions based. I haven't been out on the golf course yet. I'll go see the back nine here in a little while. But I have a 3-wood now that I can turn over off the tee and carry it a little further. So that tee shot hopefully will become a little bit easier for me. I hit a cut predominantly with my driver. So it's not a tee shot for me. I haven't had a lot of success on 18. So I'm looking forward to getting out there and seeing what the conditions are, and maybe getting comfortable with that 3-wood off that tee.

Q. So you mentioned Wayne having conversations with you. You talked about addressing the weekend. But when he's keeping you in the moment, I know him as a fun guy on the range. Everybody knows him as a fun guy. But what kinds of things does he say to you to keep you loose and patient?
TROY MERRITT: He's probably the most positive person I've ever met. He's also very competitive. He really wants to win badly. I know I saw an article that he did with the caddie network saying that he wanted that flag more than the money. That goes to show you who he is. But it's just focusing on one shot, focusing on a specific target, and being confident in what he says. He says it over and over and over until you absolutely believe you're going to hit a great shot or you're going to make a putt.

I haven't had that from a caddie throughout my career. And Wayne does a really good job of keeping that in perspective.

Q. With your second PGA TOUR victory, you now get to play in the PGA Championship, as you said. Now you get an exempt into the 2019-2020 season. So at this point in your career, what's it mean to you to get the opportunity to play more tournaments and be in the mix?
TROY MERRITT: Yeah, I had this conversation with a few people that I've had three-year run of at least playing in one major, and it was looking like it was not going to happen again. With this win yesterday, you know, we get that PGA. For guys like me that haven't had the success that those top guys have, being able to tee it up against them in the biggest tournaments is pretty cool.

It's pretty special. It's something you really have to relish and be humbled by it at the same time. So I'm looking forward to it. I've got family from Iowa that are probably going to make the trip down and watch. They get to come down and watch another tournament besides the John Deere. I'm really looking forward to Maui. Having been able to tee it up there in 2016, I always wanted to start my calendar year there, and haven't been there for a couple years. So I'm really looking forward to that one just a much.

JOHN BUSH: Troy, we appreciate your time, let's make it two weeks in a row.

TROY MERRITT: That would be fun. Thanks, guys.

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