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JOHN DEERE CLASSIC

July 14, 2019

Viktor Hovland

Silvis, Illinois

Q. You've played a ton of this year. What's been the key to your consistent play?
VIKTOR HOVLAND: You know, kind of the strength of my game is that don't -- my misses aren't too far off line, and when you know where your misses are, you can play around it. Now, I need to get a little bit better hitting my good shots a little bit more often, but today I got to show that. But yeah, when you can kind of limit the misses in certain areas, you can -- you know, it's hard to make doubles and you can play around it.

Q. You were dripping wet in sweat, because it was a hot one out there. Looking forward, what's on the radar? What are you looking at?
VIKTOR HOVLAND: Two weeks off. Going to do nothing for a little bit, and then Wyndham Championship is my last sponsor's exemption. So hopefully make a move there.

Q. Obviously no one likes to bogey the last hole but there was a lot of good golf out there today. When you got to the golf course, did you want to be aggressive or did you just go into an aggressive mode?
VIKTOR HOVLAND: I don't know, I tried to kind of keep the same mind-set that I had been, but for some reason, I've been playing good the last three Sundays. I don't know if I just kind of keep -- it's the same game plan, but I don't know if I'm just kind of freeing up a little bit more. But today, just kind of, you know, instead of hitting good shots that would be 15 feet short or 15 feet past, they were suddenly now pin-high, and I gave myself more closer birdie putts and I was able to make them to keep building on it.

Yeah, so I don't know, just kind of happened today.

Q. You and your caddie were at the 17th, par 5, playing to that hole location. You chose a 6-iron. When you hit it, what were you thinking?
VIKTOR HOVLAND: Yeah, I had to take a little off of the 6-iron, and you know, he wanted me to hit a full 7. I thought I could get there but I just felt a little bit more uncomfortable with a soft 6, and as soon as it came off, it came out high, a little cute, right at the pin. The wind was howling, and I was yelling "Sit!" at it. I thought it might have been a little too far, but it happened to pitch right by the hole and that was a pretty nice 3.

Q. You've been fortunate to play both as an amateur and now as a professional on the PGA TOUR. What has surprised you the most now that you're a professional about playing out here?
VIKTOR HOVLAND: That's a good question. Again, obviously you're playing for money, but that hasn't really affected my mind-set. I still just try to play my game and you know, there's nothing really a whole lot different. You're just on the leaderboard, it says amateur and now it just says Viktor Hovland. Nothing too much different, really.

Q. Three weeks in a row, a great final round, were you kicking yourself for not starting earlier, or just the way it's gone?
VIKTOR HOVLAND: Well, I would have been kicking myself harder if it was the other way around. So I'm pretty pleased with having good Sunday finishes to kind of climb up the leaderboard the way I have been. But obviously if I just get myself in a little better position going into Sunday, that could be really interesting.

Q. Did you change your mindset or routine heading into Sunday after Travelers? Since then, 64, 65, 64.
VIKTOR HOVLAND: A little bit. I got off to a bad start Sunday at the Travelers, and I was playing decent golf, but I just couldn't get anything to happen. I was probably in maybe 60th place after that bad start, and I just figured, like I didn't give up, but I just figure, okay, I'm going to shoot like 6-under on the back. If you finish 60th or 55th or 50th, it really doesn't matter.

But then after I finished the day, if I would have played solid golf, finished 3-under on the last 11 holes or something, that would have gotten me maybe to 30th place, and that's pretty important FedExCup points.

I don't know, I was probably 39th or 40th going into today, and I was probably around there last week, as well. So that just goes to show that you can do a lot of climbing if you just have a good Sunday.

Q. What kind of confidence does this do for your game; that you can do have this round on a Saturday or a Friday?
VIKTOR HOVLAND: Yeah, I mean, it will be a little different if I'm in one of the last groups on Sunday. It's a little tougher to shoot 64, 65, but you know, I've just got to get a little better here or there and hopefully it will happen more on Thursdays and Fridays, as well.

Q. What's your next tournament?
VIKTOR HOVLAND: Wyndham.

Q. You mentioned that you figured out where to miss and that has a lot to do with your Sunday scoring. Are you learning, Thursday, Friday, Saturday?
VIKTOR HOVLAND: Mostly kind of referring more to my own game, kind of where my bad shots go. If I know that my miss is a little right with the driver, I'll just err a little bit where I aim more left off the tee, and you know, just swing hard and I know it's not going to go left. So that kind of gives me a parameter of where my ball is not going to end up. It's not a perfect shot but as long as it's in this area, I know how to score from there.

Q. Will familiarity with golf courses make a big difference?
VIKTOR HOVLAND: I think so, that's one of the other reasons why I've done better on Sundays.

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