TRAVELERS CHAMPIONSHIP

June 23, 2022

Xander Schauffele

TPC River Highlands

Quick Quotes

Q. How many times have you hit 18 out of 18 greens?

XANDER SCHAUFFELE: I mean, I've done it in practice back at home, but it's a totally different thing, obviously, with the wind kind of being a lot of crosswinds. Sometimes it's okay. I think 9 is a good example, if you go just over the green on the right it's not that hard of a putt, so there's spots out here where it's okay to miss the green and be on the fringe.

Q. How much pressure do you feel when you go out in the morning, half an inch of rain the day before, on a course that's given up a 58? You've got to know it's a green light special all the way around.

XANDER SCHAUFFELE: Yeah, you don't really go out and try and shoot 58; you just kind of do it. I wouldn't be able to speak to it since I've never done it, but I probably had enough putts today to shoot something in the 50s, I think. I didn't really make any long putts, so it was kind of a testament to how well I hit it.

Q. Does a tournament like this coming after the U.S. Open where par is always a great score, it's a real grind mentally and physically and you come to a golf course like this birdies to be made someone is going to probably shoot 63. Refreshing and invigorating I would imagine?

XANDER SCHAUFFELE: Yeah, it is. It's one of those courses if you're living in the rough all day it's going to be a long day. You can't really get too aggressive to pins. I was in the rough a few times. Fortunately I had room to run up the ball. I got nine yards of roll on a couple of wedge shots out of the rough. It's not too hard to shoot level par or nothing too low if you're not in the fairway off the tee.

Q. Do you almost feel like you have to shoot a round like today, a 63, in order to be in contention on a Sunday?

XANDER SCHAUFFELE: You'll take a 63 whenever. I'm not too picky. But it definitely helps.

Q. On the other hand, is there a little bit of pressure when you know you've shot a 63 and there are four or five guys right with you there after the first round?

XANDER SCHAUFFELE: It's what you expect. Being out here, you expect everyone to shoot -- if it's not too windy and the greens are soft with that rain from last night, you expect a few guys to shoot -- someone this afternoon might shoot 9-under. We've been out here and we've played courses that are twice as long as this one and guys are shooting 30-under for the week. For some reason, I don't know if it's me, but I just feel like I expect everyone to shoot super low.

Q. When you come off a grind like the Open is and every year it's the same thing to different degrees, how much do you look forward to coming to a place like this where birdies are a little bit more accessible? A lot of guys don't like to play tournaments where 20-under might win.

XANDER SCHAUFFELE: Sure. Yeah, this course protects itself. It did rain last night, but if it didn't rain, the course is pretty firm. Mid teens to high teens have won this tournament. If you finish in the high teens you're in a pretty good spot for the week. If it stays soft, it may be lower than that for the week. I think it's just a forgiveness thing. After playing the U.S. Open you kind of beat yourself up all week and then you kind of hit a bad shot on a day like today and your ball may stay on the green and not roll off into some ankle-high rough. I think mentally it's a little bit more forgiving.

Q. Where do you feel like your form is right now? Obviously today was fantastic, but as you've been going on here, because you've had so many good runs in majors and whatnot, but haven't crossed the line in those yet. Where do you feel like your form is?

XANDER SCHAUFFELE: It's good. It's been really solid. I've just been talking to my dad. He thinks I'm tinkering too much. He wants me to do what I did today. Just Austin and I work together, focus a lot on land numbers, just numbers in general versus me trying to tinker with my golf swing too much. It kind of made me hone in on targets versus sort of golf swing.

I've been playing pretty solid, just haven't really gotten over the hump this year in terms of putting a string of tournaments together that are really good.

Q. What's your philosophy on the 15th hole? Today the pin location was forward. We've seen guys hitting irons, guys hitting driver. It's giving up scores, but a lot of guys put it in the water left. What determines in your mind when you're going to be more aggressive and when you're going to be maybe lay farther back?

XANDER SCHAUFFELE: You pretty much try and hit to the front right portion in that little shaded area every time and play from there. If you don't hit it there then you have to figure it out.

Q. You mentioned that you thought you had a later tee time. How do you let that not mentally affect you and overthink it?

XANDER SCHAUFFELE: Yeah, I really -- yeah, for whatever reason I really thought I was teeing off at 7:50. My tee time tomorrow is 12:50, so maybe that was the mix-up. But it was a pretty big rookie move on my behalf. When I'm at home -- I'll warm up in the gym or with a physio, but when I'm at home I'll show up for an 8:00 tee time at 7:55, maybe hit two putts and then just start swinging, so take advantage of the youth, I guess.