ABU DHABI HSBC GOLF CHAMPIONSHIP

January 21, 2022

Ian Poulter

Yas Links

Quick Quotes

IAN POULTER: I've got to be honest, you look at the forecast and you felt the wind as strong as it was, you'd have thought the ball would be moving but didn't have any balls moving on the green. Had to back off because you were getting blown around but the ball wasn't really moving, so a surprise, and just had to hang in there. Birdied the first two holes and I've had two three-putt bogeys.

Q. Are these conditions to relish or just battle?

IAN POULTER: Both. Early in the season, you haven't hit those shots for quite some time and you're fighting the wind and trying to draw the golf ball. It's really tricky. So you know, a poor shot with the wrong wind gets really punished. I really only hit one or two of those but I didn't really get punished.

I got to the last hole today and had a 25-foot birdie putt and when you've birdied 1 and 2, it takes you all the way around to 18, it's like, tease been a while before you have another good look at making birdie. But that was tough. That was tricky. That was dicey hitting some of those shots into the pins right on the edge of the water, in some respects you enjoy it and in some respects it's actually kind of miserable. So I'm hoping this afternoon they get to enjoy what we got to enjoy this morning.

When you get out to 14, the green is perched out there, and the ball didn't look like it was going to move. They have slowed it down enough that they should be okay it was actually playable.

I would have said looking at the forecast, 30-mile-an-hour gusts on this tough a golf course, you'd have thought you was going to be in trouble. Backed off a couple putts because you were getting blown around a bit but ball was pretty stationary.

You don't get to play in this kind of wind very often, especially when you've had nine weeks off and it's never going to be this windy in the off-season, so you don't really go and practise in it. To get this thrown at you early in the season is tricky. Shane would have said the same. It was kind of like, God, it's been a while since you've had to hit those type of shots. In a way, it's actually quite nice. We've played them in the past, chip-in 7-irons from 120 and hitting 3-woods from 217. You know, you've got to go into the archive and sort and of try and remember some of the shots you've played in the past.