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FUNAI GOLF CLASSIC AT WALT DISNEY WORLD RESORT


October 21, 2004


Dudley Hart


LAKE BUENA VISTA, FLORIDA

JOAN v.T. ALEXANDER: Dudley, thanks for coming in. It was a good round. We just had Tom in. He talked a little bit about the Palm Course. Why don't you talk about your day at the Mag Course.

DUDLEY HART: Well, we started pretty early, and the golf course was pretty wet, obviously had a little bit of rain around here the last few months. The course is playing long but it's also playing a lot easier than they probably want it to as far as the greens go. It made shooting at the pins a lot easier obviously.

If I didn't hit the ball a little bit better than I did today, I don't think I would be in here talking to you. I know that sounds crazy shooting 6-under. I got away with some pretty bad swings and didn't drive the ball real well. I hit some good iron shots, but I hit a couple bad shots at the wrong time that ended up in a bad spot, and they were kind of just not quite bad enough to be in the water or up against a tree somewhere, so I got lucky on a few bad swings, but I made some putts.

About three or four weeks I've been hitting it as good as I can hit it and not scoring real well, so it was nice today to not hit it as well and get a lot out of my round because I hadn't been getting a lot out of my rounds in the past, which is a good sign.

Hopefully if I can tighten it up and swing a little bit and hit it better, hopefully everything -- I can be in here talking with you lovely people the rest of the week.

Q. Are the triplets on the road with you this week? Do you do that often or is this sort of a coming out party for them?

DUDLEY HART: I do it quite a bit. They probably travel -- I mean, I haven't really -- I would say they probably came on the road 12 to 14 times this year with me. I try not to go more than two weeks without seeing them. They're almost three now, so obviously school is not an issue. They can come out and travel as much as they want.

It gets a little bit more hectic, but at the same time, I just went two weeks, I went Vegas and Greensboro, without seeing them, and Greensboro, that part of the week is crazy. For me I kind of feel like I want to be home almost more than I want to be playing golf, and I think ultimately it helps to have people think, man, it's got to be hard and distracting to play with them on the road, and I look at it where they're there and I'm not missing them and wanting them to be at the course, so I think it'll give me a better opportunity to play well because my mind is not elsewhere. I don't sleep quite as much, but --

Q. Do they avail themselves of most of the theme park stuff?

DUDLEY HART: Yeah, I had the longest day of my life on Tuesday. We took them over to the park, and that was -- I played a practice round and then went over there at about 11:00 and waited with everybody else in that line at Dumbo for 45 minutes, sweating like crazy. Trying to keep three kids patient for 45 minutes in a line that goes back and forth is not easy, but they enjoy it.

They're at that age where they're just starting to get some of that stuff. We took them on the Teacups and they liked that and I almost threw up. It's going to keep getting better and better. People always ask how you do it with three little kids, and it's all we know. We just do it. We love them and we do what we have to do, and we have three beautiful kids and they're fun to watch.

Q. Has it been...(inaudible)... on the golf course of your life?

DUDLEY HART: What do you mean by that (laughter)?

Q. Has that helped your patience become a little bit --

DUDLEY HART: You want me to tell you the truth?

Q. I have a three-month-old. I know it kind of comes and goes.

DUDLEY HART: I would say probably not for the most part. When I get on the course, I'm still the competitor that I've been and I'm still tough on myself. It's helped me probably not dwell on playing poorly and things like that as much just because I know when I'm done, as soon as I'm off the course, you know, I'm seeing my kids. You forget about everything. You just have a good time. They love me, or at least two of the three love me, no matter how I play. The other one doesn't really care about that too much right now.

Q. Is it tiring at all?

DUDLEY HART: Like I said, I don't really look at it as a distraction as much. My wife is great about -- like playing early this morning, last night at about 9:30, I said, I'm going to go in there and shut it down. We've got a two-bedroom place, so she understands that I've got to get some sleep, and the kids were kind of riled up last night at about that time. Usually we're trying to get them down. As long as I get enough sleep, I'm not really worried about all that other stuff.

I mean, a lot of people have kids running around and they're running crazy 24/7. I'm not anything special in that regard.

Q. Billy Andrade, I guess he's only one of two democrats on the PGA TOUR. Do you guys give him much grief for his political views?

DUDLEY HART: I don't really. I'm not a real political person. I think they're all full of garbage personally. You can quote me on that. I think about 1 percent of what they say is believable on both sides, so I don't get into the political stuff too much. We give Billy plenty of grief about plenty of things, so that might be another reason to give him some crap.

Q. (Inaudible).

DUDLEY HART: Yeah, we talk about it a lot. Chris is probably a little more -- not probably, definitely into the Gator football more than I am. I love the football team. He's just fanatical about it. He's one of those fans like even if I try to talk to him about whether we might have a tough year this year, no, no, it doesn't matter if we have all freshmen on the team. He's that type where everything is rosy. He can't really look at it with an open mind and say, yeah, we've got too many young guys, this, that, whatever. He's a big fan, and he's always been crazy about it. It's tough to go watch a game with him, I'll admit that. He's so into it, especially if he has a few beers.

Q. (Inaudible).

DUDLEY HART: I think he might have helped fund it. I'm not sure.

JOAN v.T. ALEXANDER: You played with Briny today and I know you guys were close growing up. I'm sure you guys had a great time out there.

DUDLEY HART: We had a good time. Briny and I, we go back a long ways. My family moved down to Miami Beach when I was 14 and my dad got a club pro job at a club called LaGorce, and Briny's father Butch was still playing the Tour at that time, and they were members at this club, and Briny and I were really the only two juniors that played golf at the club that consistently played golf, so he was like a little brother to me. He and I spent a lot of time traveling, playing tournaments in the summers, playing golf in the winter, and if he comes in here next, I'm sure he'll tell you that I just used to wear him out like a big brother would wear a little brother out. I probably over-abused him and caused some permanent damage. I don't do it anymore because now he's big enough to hit back.

JOAN v.T. ALEXANDER: Thank you, Dudley.

End of FastScripts.

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