JTBC CLASSIC PRESENTED BY BARBASOL

March 24, 2022

Mo Martin

Aviara Golf Club

Quick Quotes

Q. Here with Mo Martin, solid 4-under start to your week out here. Afternoon wave 4-under is pretty solid with those greens out there.

MO MARTIN: Oh, for sure. I finished with four birdies in a row. You know, this is a really challenging golf course. It builds in difficulty to some degree, so to finish that way, I mean, I just want to go to 10 right now and just start my second round. Let's go. We got another 30 minutes.

So super fun. It's just it was really nice to be an athlete again, you know. It's been some time off and some challenges with my body, and I've got a really strong crowd out here, which is a great comeback, too, from last year. It was like no spectators, no gallery. It was pretty funky. This feels like a really nice return.

Q. How good does it feel being one of the hometown kids out here?

MO MARTIN: I've always considered this a hometown event even though I was raised in Altadena, California, which is -- it's less than two hours away, but when I was a rookie we only had this tournament and Palm Springs.

And so this was -- and I fell in love with this golf course the first time we played it. I actually finished third here first time I played it, so obviously just so many good memories.

And the community here is super cool. I've become really good friends with the manager of the volunteers and a lot of the volunteers. They've kind of adopted me as their hometown girl, too.

So I feel a lot of the support. I love this place. My family can commute down here and my friends. Even had some friends fly in from Pennsylvania.

So I have a really good crowd and it was a really good feeling.

Q. And feel free to say no if you don't want to talk about this. I know your plans at the end of the year are a little unsure at the moment. Can you elaborate on that?

MO MARTIN: Yeah, I've had a lot of health surprises, and so, you know, putting the work in and putting my body through that stress is kind of questionable, so I need to taper off for my body.

I think it's done really well for me. I've been super lucky. I've been playing golf since I was three years old.

But, yeah, I'm going to be tapering off, so I don't know exactly when the end is going to be. It's in sight. You know, I don't know exactly which stop sign it is, though.

But it's coming. I just owe that to my body. I pushed it a lot and I have a lot of the health issues at the moment, so I'm just -- any time I can be out here and enjoy it and be an athlete and play like I just did, it reminds me of how much fun I've had and how beautiful this has been and that I can still play.

So it's really fun to still feel like an athlete. At the end of the day I need to respect my body.