U.S. OPEN CHAMPIONSHIP

June 18, 2004

Tiger Woods

MODERATOR: Ladies and gentlemen, joining us on the podium now, plus 1 for the championship, minus 1 in his round today, Tiger Woods.

Q. Was that hard work or fun?

TIGER WOODS: It was both. It's a challenge, that golf course out there today. It's interesting, Steve and I were talking, the whole group was talking about it, the wind did a whole 180 on us. After about four or five holes it completely switched. You had to make adjustment on your lines and angles off the tees and the club selection. It was a day of patience.

Q. Did that up-and-down on 18 serve as a springboard for the weekend?

TIGER WOODS: It was nice. But I still had nine more holes to go. I put myself in trouble on the second hole, but I made a great par putt there to keep the momentum going. I figured, hang in there, keep being patient. It's the U.S. Open, you have to hang in there, and eventually, I thought I was playing well enough to make a few birdies.

And the thing is not to force it, not on this golf course. You have to be patient, and eventually some birdies did come.

Q. When was your patience challenged?

TIGER WOODS: Just the whole day. It's the U.S. Open. Patience is challenged on the very first tee, all the way through 18 holes. We all know that. Everyone who plays this golf course and this tournament knows it's going to be challenged all day. You have to keep hanging in there.

Q. Were you trying to get to even?

TIGER WOODS: Yeah, that would have been nice to do that. But I'm pleased to be where I'm at, too.

Q. (Inaudible).

TIGER WOODS: I would like to have it be that. It was nice actually to make something positive happen. But as you know, if you look at it -- look at most of the guys out there, they're not getting the ball close. If they're making birdies, they're making 15, 20-footers. I watched Maruyama do that the last two days. He hit it close on a couple of par-5s.

That's the nature of this golf course. The way they have the pins tucked, and maybe like eight or nine from the side, but you have that huge false edge. You keep putting yourself in the middle of the greens.

Q. Obviously he must have something working out there?

TIGER WOODS: He didn't fire at a lot of flags. He fired away from a lot of flags, put himself in spots where he could have those 15, 20-footers, and he made a few of those. He never put himself in danger of making a lot of bogeys. That's the whole key of playing an Open.

Q. You made your saving putts; are you disappointed in the ones you did have 15 feet?

TIGER WOODS: We were talking about how slow the greens were, and we were all leaving putts short. We played Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, the greens were a lot faster than this. And even yesterday, the rain yesterday slowed things up quite a bit. And I hit two putts that were dead center, right in the middle of the hole, and probably a couple of inches short. That's the difference between yesterday and today's speed.

Q. (Inaudible).

TIGER WOODS: Because this golf course, it's so difficult that you know the guys aren't going to be shooting extremely low rounds on the weekend. You've got to keep hanging in there and keep moving forward. If I keep doing that, I'll be all right.

Q. There's two schools of thought on the wind; it would separate the men from the boys. What school do you come from?

TIGER WOODS: I'd much rather see the wind blow. It provides more of a challenge, and guys who are controlling the ball and play basically links golf on a U.S. Open setup if the wind blows the way it did in the practice rounds.

It hasn't since. It's been changing. The wind has been all over the place. It keeps changing each and every day. So from that aspect, it's been a challenge trying to figure out the way it's coming from. It did a 180 on us today. And we played 14 in left-to-right and -- actually right-to-left and it should have been that way on 15, and 16 should have been down, but it's completely switched. You have to make your adjustments.

Q. You see a few more red numbers than we're used to on a U.S. Open board. Do you get frustrated and say you should be scoring?

TIGER WOODS: No, because you look at the way you scored the last few times, and you know all it takes is one day for the wind to blow. If they're right, the forecast, it's supposed to blow on Sunday. If that's the case you never know.

Q. Do you feel comfortable about your game going into the weekend?

TIGER WOODS: I felt like I hit the ball great decent, not great. I have to --

Q. When you're playing out there, how much are you actually thinking about your golf swing compared to just playing the golf course?

TIGER WOODS: You have to hit shots. You're thinking about one key or something like that, but that's usually because you're trying to shape a shot a certain way. If I'm trying to hit a fade, I think a certain shot, if I'm hitting it low, if I'm hitting it high. You have certain key thoughts you always go back to, to certain thoughts. And out here, it seems like every single shot you have to shape it every single way. It keeps your mind occupied.

Q. (Inaudible).

TIGER WOODS: Where are you going to be more aggressive at?

Q. You're under 50 percent of fairways hit the first few days.

TIGER WOODS: Actually, I'll be honest with you, if you look at most of the guys on that board, they're not hitting a lot of fairways, either. On the computer last night, see if I was not -- if I'm doing something different than anyone else, but the key is to miss it in the first cut. Like yesterday I hit five fairways and four balls in the first cut.

So that's kind of the nature of this golf course. Fairways are fast, it's rolling, mounds, you're going to hit balls in the first cut. It's just not to hit it in the deep stuff.

Q. (Inaudible).

TIGER WOODS: No, no, not at all. We're all humbled by golf. Every one of us who plays golf has hit one great shot and the next shot you go, "Who is this guy?" That's the nature of golf. That's why we play. That's the challenge of golf.

Q. It can happen to any of us.

TIGER WOODS: It can happen to anybody, yeah, it can. It can happen to anybody. And the key is to keep practicing, keep working on it. If you have good fundamentals, I think that's the key. You have good fundamentals to go back to.

Q. (Inaudible).

TIGER WOODS: You try not to. We ended up mostly talking about the fish he's been catching. I saw some great photos that Mitch showed me about their fishing trip in Georgia, some pretty big rainbows.

Q. (Inaudible).

TIGER WOODS: Probably, he's doing the right thing, because this is -- he's not the biggest story line. If he came back at Memorial or Westchester -- you'd guys would have been killing him for interviews and pictures and cameras and everybody. He did the smart thing.

End of FastScripts.