THE SENIOR OPEN PRESENTED BY ROLEX

July 25, 2021

Stephen Dodd

Sunningdale Golf Club

Quick Quotes

THE MODERATOR: You are the Senior Open Presented by Rolex Champion, just give us a summary of how you're feeling right now.

STEPHEN DODD: Do you know, I'm not sure it's sunk in yet. It's been quite a tough day. Wasn't playing great. So I'm sure on the drive home I'm reflect on it all and I'll be a very happy person when I get back home later tonight.

Q. You hit an incredible shot into 18 and you looked very calm over a birdie putt. What was going through your mind at that moment?

STEPHEN DODD: This could be the only chance I get to win, so tried my best to hole it. Thankfully for me it went in, so it was a nice way to finish for me.

Q. You went into today with a two-stroke lead, and there was many major champions, senior major champions chasing you down. What was the mindset like at the start of the day?

STEPHEN DODD: Just wanted to try and enjoy it. I said yesterday I've not played any competitive golf -- well, one tournament in 18 or 19 months, so there's no real competitive golf behind me, so I didn't know what to expect this week, and even today, I didn't play great today, like a few of the previous days, so I just ground it out and made a few silly mistakes and made up with a couple decent shots and some putts.

Q. You made two bogeys but then responded straightaway with birdies. How important was that to keep the momentum going?

STEPHEN DODD: I think it was important. Because one bogey quite easily leads to two or three and I didn't let that happen today. So I think I deserve a bit of a pat on the back for that.

Q. You also get an exemption into The Open at St Andrews next year. Just how special will that be?

STEPHEN DODD: I didn't realise till you just said that. Yeah, that's 150, so that will be special. I'll have to start trying to hit it a bit harder and further.

Q. And how does this change things for you moving forward? It's a massive win, your first senior major?

STEPHEN DODD: I'll look at it over the coming weeks and decide then. I'm not sure what lies ahead at the moment. It's just too early for me to decide what's going to happen, but I would like to play a bit in America.

Q. You said you had not played much competitive golf in the last 18 months. How did you approach this week?

STEPHEN DODD: I did some good work on Monday with my coach, Denis Pugh, but it kind of gradually got a bit worse as the week went on. Expectation-wise, I didn't really have any expectations, because as I said, I played so little competitive golf that I just wanted to play well and just do myself a bit of justice, and I think I've done a bit more than that, luckily.

Q. It's always special to win a tournament of this size but to do it like a golf course like Sunningdale, how good was it and how good was the golf course this week?

STEPHEN DODD: As I said the course was fabulous and it was a very, very fair test of golf. If we played well, we could score; if we hit it on line, there was danger all over the place, even just on short 320-yard holes, there was so much danger. It was a very strategic course and course management was needed.

Q. Obviously down the stretch you, Darren and Miguel were having a bit of a battle. How aware were you of what was going on? Were you leaderboard-watching?

STEPHEN DODD: Yeah, I knew exactly where I was. I like to see the scoreboards and know what I need to do. For me it focuses my mind more an what I need to do. I hit some decent shots coming down the last few holes.

Q. A little bit of a wait on 18, as well. Did that help or were you keen to get it over with?

STEPHEN DODD: I didn't realise there was a wait.

Q. Might have been on 17.

STEPHEN DODD: There was a bit of 17 but part and parcel of what we have to do. We have to wait at times. We deal with it, we were chatting and pretty relaxed out there.

THE MODERATOR: Once again, many, many congratulations, a richly deserved champion and enjoy it.

STEPHEN DODD: Thank you. Thanks very much.