AT&T BYRON NELSON

May 13, 2021

Rafa Cabrera Bello

TPC Craig Ranch

Quick Quotes

Q. An 8-under 64 to start the tournament. Must be a great way to get good start here?

RAFA CABRERA BELLO: Yes, absolutely. I mean, obviously very pleased with the round. It's been a tough year. I'm not really finding much of, I mean, my best golf, but today felt really nice. I played overall very good. No regrets.

I got off to a very, very strong start and was maybe a time where I had a long putt to save par, would've meant the second bogey of the day, and I managed to hole that and I gained momentum at the end and finished strong.

Q. You had the chip-in on the first hole, right?

RAFA CABRERA BELLO: Yeah.

Q. When you made that, did you think this was going to be a special round?

RAFA CABRERA BELLO: No. To be fair, the last two events I missed the cut and I started with birdie first hole that I played, so I told my brother, I hope this doesn't mean that we're going to play bad the rest of the day. So that was the first thing that went through my mind.

Then I birdie the next hole. I was like, okay. So just put some in the credit department.

Q. Glad it ended up okay.

RAFA CABRERA BELLO: Yeah.

Q. You mentioned your game has been up and down. What's been the challenge and what was difference today?

RAFA CABRERA BELLO: Well, I mean, I struggle mainly with the irons. Short game in general has been good. Putting has been streaky, but in general I wasn't really worried about it. Driving, normally, I mean, I don't drive it very long but I tend to be accurate enough. It's been the irons. Haven't been hitting as many greens, not giving myself lots of decent birdie chances, so then I'm obviously putting a lot of pressure at putt and the short game as well.

Today I felt I hit lots of great iron shots. I'm curious to check the stats and see the shots gained, but I really hit them close as well. So, yeah, I mean, that's clearly the biggest difference, yeah.

Q. Great round today. Best of luck the rest of the week.

RAFA CABRERA BELLO: Thank you.