KEMPER INSURANCE OPEN

June 2, 2002

Bob Burns

JOE CHEMYCZ: Take some questions. Bob, welcome. I know it's a disappointing finish for you, but a very good week and just talk a little bit about the day if you would, please.

BOB BURNS: Well, sure, overall in the big scheme of things I'm a little disappointed in not being able to take away a victory. But I'm also very proud of myself. Meaning that I hung in there and I was there right there until the end. And honestly, when I did make the double bogey on 16, I hit the two best shots of the day. My tee shot and the approach. And you're going to get some bad breaks even if you hit good shots or bad shots out here. Unfortunately I carried it a little too far and it went back into the chasm behind the green on the left. Didn't perform very well from there. But overall, I'm very pleased. My friends, my fiance flew in on a red-eye from Los Angeles last night and I'm sure they're tired as heck and we're all going to watch the Laker game tonight. Drink some soda. I take a lot of positive vibes away from this experience. I'll learn from it. And I know that there's some things in my game that I revert to under pressure and that's something have I to work on and I get underneath it a little bit and I hit some shots like I did at 18 and it will cause me to spray it a little bit left and right off the tee. But that's just part of the job.

Q. Talk about the hole in one.

BOB BURNS: That was really cool.

(Laughter.) I was grinding all day, not getting a whole lot going, making some pars, birdie and bogey here and there. And I almost hit the ball back there yesterday to that pin position. I think if it was yesterday or Friday, but anyway the pin was in the front left, one of the last couple days and I hit the same shot and it almost went back there. So I knew what shot I had to hit to get it become to this pin it was 157 yards and I hit a 9-iron just up on the right side trying to let it feed down close to the hole and lo and behold it went in. Which is obviously a blessing. It's not going to happen every time you don't hit a ball straight at the hole every time.

Q. That was the shot that you wanted to hit it was not a lucky bounce it that was the shot you wanted?

BOB BURNS: I pushed it way right. I was trying to fly it in the hole actually but, no, that's the shot for that hole. The wind is off the right a little bit. You're going to try and feed something down that hill there.

Q. That shot goes in at that point do you think I can win this tournament? What is your you're two strokes ahead, seven to play.

BOB BURNS: I thought I could win the tournament before I teed off. I wasn't sure that I would. But no, I didn't take the hole in one for me to think that I could win the tournament. Obviously when I did, I guess I had the one shot lead at the moment or maybe two, I don't know. Two? And obviously it would have been great to par in, but this is a tough golf course and it's playing fast, the greens are firm and it's windy out there.

Q. (Inaudible.)

BOB BURNS: I might have been a bad decision to putt that ball, but I didn't, I couldn't really come up with anything else to do. I just didn't hit it quite hard enough and it looked like pretty fresh young grass over there. And it just held it up. I never hit it hard enough, obviously. And then I hit the second putt too hard off the first cut of the fringe over the mound and that was it. Just missed, about a three and a half, four foot putt which is no big deal because I've done that many times, unfortunately it happened when I was right in contention. The positive, the hole in.

Q. The hole in one when it happened is such an unusual thing you don't see that in the stretches of a tournament when they have got a chance to win. Have you done anything even remotely like that or can you remember ever seeing anyone do anything remotely like that?

BOB BURNS: Have I seen anybody do that? I haven't done it, no. No, I haven't done that. In my two victories on the Nike Tour I was just very, very steady and kind of parred everybody to death. But my two wins on the Nike Tour were also on very difficult golf courses, so I could do that. But I'm sure Gamez has holed out on the last hole to beat Norman 10 years ago as a rookie there at Bay Hill. It happens. It was kind of fun that it happened to me.

Q. Back to 16. Could you see what the ball was doing? You heard a wide range of emotion from the crowd obviously, could you see the hole thing?

BOB BURNS: Well I loved it from the fairway. And I saw that it bounced pretty firm and actually carried past the hole. Where I found my ball mark and I didn't go my ball would carry that far. Then I saw it hop up on top and kind of spin back to the left and they were cheering and all of a sudden the ball disappeared and everybody started moaning. And then I got to the I guess it kept rolling and went down to the sprinkler head so everybody started cheering. So I didn't know what was going on.

Q. How close did it come from stopping? Could you tell by that roar?

BOB BURNS: No, that kind of chaffs me hearing that now, though. No, I didn't know if it stopped. I hoped it stopped, but.

Q. It kept rolling.

BOB BURNS: Really?

Q. You said that the two wins that you had you parred everybody to death. That's sort of what Bob did today. On this kind of course and these kind of conditions is that usually the guy -- I mean unless somebody goes out and shoots a 64 is that usually the guy who wins who just does that kind of stuff most always?

BOB BURNS: Generally speaking, unless somebody has a real hot round. Everyone was bunched up today. It could have been anybody, you know, but maybe a couple shots back shooting three under, 4-under getting to 12. I don't know what the low score was today. Anybody know what that was? 4-under maybe?

Q. 4-under?

BOB BURNS: 67. So that just shows you that the golf course was playing pretty solid when that many guys on Sunday can only muster up 4-under. Did that answer the question? No.

Q. Bob doesn't make a lot of mistakes and that makes it more difficult to beat him in these conditions do you think?

BOB BURNS: Sure. Sure. He is tied for the lead and he makes 17 pars and a birdie. That's pretty solid golf. That is tough to beat if you make a few mistakes, which, you know, 70 percent, 80 percent of the professionals out here are doing. He's four time winner now so he's got a pretty good credibility.

Q. (Inaudible.)

BOB BURNS: I thought I did. I thought I heard somebody say splash or go in the water or something like that. Yeah. I don't know if it did or not. It didn't affect the shot much.

Q. (Inaudible.)

BOB BURNS: It did to me. It did to me.

Q. We didn't see many people go at that pin on 16 maybe because of exactly what happened, it trickled off that back front edge. What was the mindset behind taking that aggressive approach instead of maybe doing what Bob did, just threw it up there and hoping it trickled down a little bit?

BOB BURNS: Well it was perfect. It fit my shot. The wind was off the right a little bit. I had 140 to the hole, 139, I think. And it was just a perfect little draw 9-iron. And the wind may have been helping or just two or three degrees more out of the direction going towards help. That carried the ball further. It was coming in perfect. It was 10, 15 feet right of the hole with a draw. Going to bounce and stop and be somewhere within 10 feet is what I thought.

Q. Both you and Rich have missed, have mentioned how much you get mixed up for each other. There's got to be a couple of good store rest on it and have you ever played a trick in reverse with it or anything?

BOB BURNS: No. We haven't done anything crazy yet. We just -- Rich gets a little pissed off when people say hi Burns, Bob, what's going on. People call me Rich or Beemer, I say hey, how's it going?

(Laughter.) We tease each other a lot about that. Anything else? Okay. All set.

JOE CHEMYCZ: Bob, thank you.

BOB BURNS: All right. Thank you.

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