BUICK CLASSIC

June 22, 2001

J.P. Hayes

J.P. HAYES: Well, it was pretty good all day long. I think I missed one fairway all day. I missed maybe just a handful of greens and putted quite well. Made a couple of long putts which I haven't done in a while. Just managed the course really well. Pretty stress-free day. I really didn't come close to making a lot of bogeys. I made a few. You are going to make them on the golf course, so, it was a lot of fun.

J.P. HAYES: Yeah, definitely. Even when I am not here, I look back on that tournament. It was, you know, a great time in my career. But yeah, I love playing out here. The course is beautiful. The thought of ever leaving this golf course, ever leaving this course really makes me sick to my stomach, but I guess that is the talk. But I will continue coming, wherever it is.

J.P. HAYES: Yeah, actually this afternoon flowed a little bit better than this morning for me. I went around this afternoon without missing fairways, and I missed a few greens, but my birdies were all reasonable birdie putts rather than -- I made a couple of bombs this morning, but everything this afternoon were putts that I should have made. So, I hit it relatively close pretty much all afternoon. I never really felt tired like I thought I might after playing for ten hours.

J.P. HAYES: I don't know what it is. Other than that I feel really comfortable I think on every tee box with what I want -- the kind of shot that I want to hit. There's not a whole lot of -- there's not a whole lot of golf courses that you can say that about. I can pretty much tell you what I am going to hit off of every tee, almost regardless of the conditions. So when you step onto a tee box, it is not like there's a decision to be made. You pretty much pull at the club; for me, there's not many golf courses like that.

J.P. HAYES: Well, I was able to, first of all, reach one of my goals, and second of all, avoid Q-School for the first time in many years. Ever since then, I have had a lot of positive things happen. This year has been a bit of a struggle up until maybe the last couple of months, where I really have seen my game turning around. I worked very hard on a couple of things that I knew would take some time, and it is starting to pay off. But as a whole, really kind of got me over a big hurdle that I never seemed to be able to get over. I had a solid year last year, and came close a number of times to winning. That just, you know, you can -- it is something that I can kind of look back on that knowing that I have done it, and it makes me more comfortable in the situations.

J.P. HAYES: I don't know, the scores aren't very low right now. And I don't think -- well, you won't think that they would get much lower just because everything is starting to dry out. The fairways are going to be harder to hit and the greens are going to be firmer, so it would be unusual for 10-under to win a PGA TOUR tournament but it could happen. It could be 10, 12. I imagine somebody will, you know, shoot some low numbers on the weekend.

J.P. HAYES: Yeah, I think I would have a lot more confidence because not only can I say, hey, I have won a tournament, but I have won on this golf course, so there's no -- there's nothing to, you know, to wonder about. I know I have done it and I know I have done it on this course, so I think that would -- that would be a big confidence boost.