THE 149TH OPEN

July 15, 2021

Nick Poppleton

Mixed Zone

Q. Nick, thanks for joining us. I'll ask but the round in a minute, but this is an interview for Radio Sheffield's breakfast show. I'll ask you about the experience of being out there and playing in The Open and making your debut and how exciting that was when you teed off, because you had to wait a while, didn't you, to tee off today?

NICK POPPLETON: Yeah, we were putting the bins out. Yeah, we were right at the back, last man. Yeah, just awesome.

Yeah, you never now how your first experience is going to go on a golf course that you've played in the past. Yeah, privilege and honor to play the event, and, yeah just to be playing golf at the moment with the way the world is is just a privilege.

Q. Were you nervous when you hit the first shot?

NICK POPPLETON: I cacked in my pants, but I've hit it a couple times over the week, so, yeah, my caddie did a good job trying to chill me out. But I don't think -- I think that's what you play for, isn't it? Everyone dreams of that moment.

Everyone has cacked their pants and topped it off the first. If you do, you just think, I had a chance to play in The Open, so it's just awesome.

Q. You made a good start as well to the round.

NICK POPPLETON: Yeah, shoveled it down there. Yeah, hit a good tee shot and kicked off into the long rough and got lucky. Got a lie and got it up there to about four feet and rolled it in.

So, yeah, just shoveled and shoveled it down there. Yeah, just lucky really more than anything.

Q. How did you find the conditions? Seemed the wind was getting up a little bit this afternoon. Is that how you found it?

NICK POPPLETON: Yeah, kind of did. Greens had a full day of growth on them, so definitely weren't as quick as they were when we practiced yesterday. Yeah, you could see the golf course has had 150 something guys through it.

Obviously going to be growing greens slower and couple pitch marks here and there on the fringe where people have been trying to feed it in. So if you hit it on the fringe it was quite tough to putt from.

That's what I found because I was missing a lot of the them anyway. Yeah, no, other than that the golf course is mint. The greens are class. They just started to grow a little bit more, and it was just something you had to adjust to.

Q. How did you find the crowds? Was it what you expected? I guess you've grown up watching on the TV for many years, particularly at 18 with the big yellow scoreboards.

NICK POPPLETON: Yeah, when you're off last they -- I think they got fed up and gone off by then. I flagged it into 16 and there was just couple greens guys clapping. Oh, yeah, class.

So, yeah, it was great on the first and amazing, but I think everyone had a long day at The Open and decided it wasn't worth sticking around the Poppleton shooting 5-over.

Q. For anybody that goes out late you end up coming back with the dust carts. When it's a smaller crowd I guess you can pick out anybody that is there with you, and presumably you've had a few friends and family members come up.

NICK POPPLETON: Oh yeah, my sister, there was some cheers from her. Yeah, she's got a mouth on her, so yeah, she was shouting and screaming for me. I was by a couple guys. Quite nice, a bit more personal and you can have a chat with people.

Q. It's been great to see your debut. Even from afar. We wish you all the best for the second round.

NICK POPPLETON: Yeah, thank you so much. Thanks, guys.