U.S. AMATEUR CHAMPIONSHIP

August 11, 2020

John Augenstein

Bandon Trails

Quick Quotes

Q. Talk about this round; you got it going there on the back side with three in a row.

JOHN AUGENSTEIN: Yeah, so coming out here today, I was just trying to shoot a solid round. I knew where I was, didn't have to do anything special, and of course you're going to get the lowest seed possible, but in the end if you make the top 64 you're going to play. Anybody can beat anybody. I came out playing well, rolling the ball well, made a few careless bogeys on the front nine, and then on the back I thought we just kind of played -- I wouldn't say conservatively, but we knew where we were, just tried to have looks on every hole, and bogeying 13 kind of felt like I got a little complacent, and then it kind of snapped me back into kind of competitive mode and was able to kind of rattle off three, 14, 15, 16.

Q. Tell me about those three birdies, how you did that.

JOHN AUGENSTEIN: Yeah, 14 was -- I guess exactly how you draw it up technically, but I hit a 3-iron, it's a drivable hole, and just got the perfect bounce that rolled up to about five feet. I know five feet sounds like you should make eagle, but it was breaking about six inches outside the left edge and the wind was at my back. I'm fine with a birdie there.

Then I hit an 8-iron to about five feet on 15, and then on 16 I hit a drive on the right side and then got it up there close to the green and hit a fine shot to about six, seven feet behind it and made it.

You know, it was good. Hit a lot of good shots coming down the stretch, but we were just trying to essentially give ourselves looks, but make sure we're ensuring pars coming down the stretch.

Q. All of your experiences in USGA championships, are you calm right now?

JOHN AUGENSTEIN: Absolutely, yeah.

Q. And why?

JOHN AUGENSTEIN: Just because I think these first two days, you're just trying to take care of business. You're not trying to do anything special. You're trying to eliminate high numbers. You just want to hit it in the fairway, hit it on the greens and keep having looks, and if you do that, you're going to be fine. I felt like my game was in a good spot coming into this week. I love this golf course. That helps. And so I think just being older and more mature now, knowing kind of where I'm at right now and knowing that my best golf is definitely yet to come this week -- I've had two solid days but none of them were special I'd say.

Q. When you're in match play now, do you feel like you're in a calm way and that hey, I'm just going to take one match at a time, I'm not in a hurry to get somewhere?

JOHN AUGENSTEIN: Absolutely, because like I said at the beginning, anybody can beat anybody. You let your guard down for a second and you'll lose. Everybody is capable of beating everybody, especially on any given day. I'm a hundred percent focused on whoever I'm playing tomorrow, and if I'm fortunate enough to win that match I'm focused on the next one and so on.