THE 149TH OPEN

July 16, 2021

Emiliano Grillo

Mixed Zone

Q. Emiliano, thanks for joining us. Must be a very happy man. Can you talk us through it?

EMILIANO GRILLO: Yeah, definitely very happy. I think I take 64 for any round in a major. I think I'll take 64 any day even play with my friends.

If definitely felt like that. The people made it so nice out there. Almost felt like I was playing with my buddies back home. It was definitely a beautiful day out there. Almost blue skies with not so much wind, so it's definitely a day where you're going to see a lot of good scores out there.

It's a hard golf course. You have to play well, but still going to see some good scores out there.

Q. Just a few questions. Yesterday you hit 6 of 14 fairways; today you hit 9. Do you think that made a big difference in the improvement of your score today?

EMILIANO GRILLO: Probably -- yes. Out here if you're not hitting fairways you're playing from the rough.

Yesterday it was maybe three or four that were from the first cut, so I honestly didn't count those as a missed fairway. The fairways, they run away from you. You could be hitting dead center the fairway and the ball could go away from the fairway and be in the rough.

It's definitely more complicated playing from the first cut or not even the rough, but definitely make a difference. Keeping the ball in play and keeping the ball in the green, it's definitely key out here.

Q. And so when you were on the 11th you were probably nine shots off the lead Collin Morikawa. Finishing on the 18th there is only three in it. With that momentum, are you hoping to take that into the weekend and challenge for a major here?

EMILIANO GRILLO: Yeah, of course. Every day you take into the next one, even yesterday I brought few birdies coming in down the stretch into today's round. So it was nice to see the putt on 2 drop and some good shots going down the stretch in the back nine.

So you take that into tomorrow's round that's for sure.

Q. Final question: Level par for the front nine and 6-under for the back nine. You definitely have a better nine from the two days. Why do you think that is? Is it just easier or does it suit you a little bit better?

EMILIANO GRILLO: I don't know. Well, back nine is definitely harder for some reason. You have better opportunities on the front. It just -- I feel it's hard to get it closer to the flags on the front nine than it is on the back nine.

Then on the back nine you have a par-5. You have 14 which is very reachable for everybody, so that makes it a bit easier. But you definitely have to play really, really well on both sides. For some reason I think it's harder on the back nine.