THE 150TH OPEN

July 15, 2022

Henrik Stenson

Mixed Zone

Q. How are you doing?

HENRIK STENSON: I've been less angry. So please keep it brief.

Q. What did you take away from playing here on The Old Course today?

HENRIK STENSON: I think it was a lot harder yesterday, and it's going to be a lovely afternoon for the guys teeing off right about now.

Q. Do you think it's one or two maybe too many for you?

HENRIK STENSON: Yeah, I'm definitely done. I've got no chance. I think probably 1-under. I don't know if level's gotten a sniff.

But given the conditions, it was a little kind of rainy. We had some layers on, and it was playing longer, and now it's kind of cleared up. Feels like it's not going to be much breeze for the afternoon, I don't think.

I don't know if something's changed in the forecast, but it's going to be a quite nice in the afternoon with slightly softer conditions. There's still some tricky pins out there, but certainly scorable on a few holes.

I had it going pretty good on the front nine and had some opportunities on 11 and 13 and 14, didn't make any of those ones. Then you've got a couple of tricky holes coming in.

Yeah, managed to make the most of those tricky holes and bogeyed both 16 and 17, and then I didn't get up and down on the last.

Yeah, a disappointing finish. Not where we wanted to be.

Q. Are you thinking 4, 3 is going to make it, last two holes, rather 5, 4?

HENRIK STENSON: Yeah, I think 1-under will make the cut. It was probably a bit of an error -- I was kind of in between clubs on 16 and didn't hit a horrific shot, but slightly too much left and came up short in the bunker. Played a good bunker shot.

Missed like a 5-footer across the ridge and then on 17 I hit a flyer out of the rough, and I thought it was going to be fine because it looked like it trickled into the bunker, but it obviously came in with a lot more pace. And it was up against the lip, and I did well to just get out of the bunker, and I ended up having to scramble for a 5.

Q. As soon as you say bunker on this course, it's a problem, isn't it?

HENRIK STENSON: Yeah, you've got to get a bit of luck. The same on 12. I hit a decent drive down the middle, and actually pay with pace went straight in the middle of that bunker short there. And you've got to have a little bit of luck when you go in them. I don't think they had that on those occasions.

Q. Protecting it against low scores has been pretty good the first two days, do you think?

HENRIK STENSON: Yeah, when it's not blowing like we had in the practise days, it's always going to be some good scores out there, I think. Someone's going to make the most out of those drivable par-4s, reachable par-5s, and then roll a couple of others in.

There are some pins that are even tougher or trickier I think, than we've seen in the past. 12, for instance, I don't think we've seen it quite up that far on the shelf. There's not much around it.

Yesterday, 13 -- there's a couple of holes that play with a certain wind direction, and given how firm the fairways are, there's a couple of holes that don't really work. 7 is one of them. If it dries out, you've got to hit it, I don't know, 250, 255 to make the caron. As soon as you do, you're running the risk of going in the big bunker. I think you'll see quite a few guys in there potentially.

And 13 yesterday is the same. Most guys normally would play that up 6, and you get an angle. Now when it's firm and bouncy, if it's downwind, you're running the risk of smashing it into the gorse bushes. Then you've got to go with the straight up shot from the rough, and yesterday you had it hurdling off the right, and the pin is all the way out there in between those two knuckles. I guess the average length would have been 60 feet on the approach shot on 13 yesterday.

Yeah, there's a couple of holes that play really difficult when it gets firm. You can certainly protect those with the pin positions and a few others.

I mean, it took six hours to play yesterday. It was pretty brutal in that sense. A lot quicker in the morning when you're not waiting on people on the way out.

Those short holes, if you play well, you're going to have birdie chances. That's why you see most of the scoring done.

Q. How will you spend the weekend? Prep for the Ryder Cup if you can't play?

HENRIK STENSON: I will do a little bit of practise tomorrow morning, I think, and I might go and play somewhere with Karl. He's over having the chance to play a little bit of links golf for the first time. So we might play another round or so.

Then we're opening a junior academy or junior course at Troon on Monday. So I'm staying around for that one.

Q. What's your upcoming schedule look like?

HENRIK STENSON: Undecided.

Q. What have you made of the Ryder Cup venue? I presume you've been to the course as well for a look around. What do you make of it?

HENRIK STENSON: We played it in September last year at the Italian Open. So we got a good look at it then. I was there with a team at end of May. Started doing some course changes, some cut lines. What makes it a little bit more difficult is that it's the paspalum fairways and fescue rough.

Wherever you want to draw a cut line in, you need to take out the fairway, put fescue in, and let it grow out. So it's a little bit more lengthy and complicated process than you might think.

There's like a fairly long list of things, together with Thomas and Eduardo, that we went through. Yeah, we left out with David Garland and the team to communicate with the people on the ground to try and get that moving.

Q. Henrik, in a couple of weeks the women are going to Muirfield to play their version of this championship. How cool is it that they finally get to get to that venue?

HENRIK STENSON: Yeah, I tell you, that's probably my favourite course on The Open rotation. They're going to enjoy that. It's a great golf course. Yeah, also, it's a good one for the Women's Open.