MASTERS TOURNAMENT

April 4, 2023

Matt Fitzpatrick

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: Good afternoon, everybody.

Matt, begin with you, on behalf of all of us at Augusta National, I'd like to welcome you back here to our course and to our tournament.

MATT FITZPATRICK: Thank you.

THE MODERATOR: Congratulations on your great win at Brookline last year, and welcome again. Glad you're here. Have a question about your dedication to data. You gather a lot of data about your game, and I'm interested to know what you do with that data to prepare for a tournament like our Masters week.

MATT FITZPATRICK: Yeah, for me, the big thing that I get out of it is certain ways to play certain holes; do I need to be more aggressive, what the scoring average is to certain pins, how my dispersions kind of decide my targets when I'm hitting into the pins.

So you know, we collect a lot of stuff, and I think it's very helpful for me in kind of organizing, you know, what I need to practice for the upcoming tournament and what areas I need to concentrate on.

THE MODERATOR: So it all hangs together.

MATT FITZPATRICK: Something like that.

Q. How would you sum up the state of your game coming into the week? It was a solid start in Hawai'i at the start of the season, but probably not the kind of form you were hoping for in most recent weeks?

MATT FITZPATRICK: Yeah, it's been a disappointing sort of year so far obviously. I kind of hurt my neck, literally, just before going to Pebble at the end of January there. And then Riviera, kind of the Friday, I started getting like sensation down my shoulder and into my chest, and my trainer was like, we should get an MRI on that and went straight to the hospital in L.A. to get an MRI. It was a slight disk bulge.

Because of that, for the previous three weeks, I wasn't able to train in the gym as I was in January; that was all put to a stop. I wasn't able to continue my speed work that was being done religiously.

The timing of it put me straight behind the 8-ball. All of a sudden, the work I had done in the off-season just became non-existent. I wasn't moving as well as I needed to to swing it as well as I needed to, and it's just been kind of compounding of errors, really. Because of my neck, then I've not been able to swing it, and then my swing has changed, kind of compensating.

Yeah, it's difficult. I've never had an injury like this. Normally if my neck has flared up, I've been over it in two or three days and I'm back to normal. Obviously this one has been a lot longer. Definitely sort of feeling better now and getting there. But I feel like, you know, certainly over the last two months, I've lost a lot of ground and definitely regressed quite a lot.

So it's kind of we're back to the bottom again and just slowly trying to build it back up. So slowly getting there, but you know, it's just going to take time. But yeah, and then because of that, that's really why I've not played great.

Q. How frustrating is that considering obviously how great 2022 was and you were looking forward to even better things this season?

MATT FITZPATRICK: Yeah, it's very, very frustrating. I think the saving grace for me is I've got my exemptions. It's not like I need to worry or panic and try and change anything. It's just going back to what we were doing before the injury. Just slowly trying to build it up and get better each day, really.

I think the big thing for me is because of this whole period, you know, mentally, I've been searching, or what is it, and probably underappreciated the injury as a whole. I probably completely underappreciated it, really, because I've just not been able to do -- it's only been the last week or two, really, that stretch where I've been able to do normal stuff again and train normally.

I think that's been a big factor in me not -- well, yeah, like I say, underappreciating the injury and the severity that it had on my game, really.

Q. Prior to the injury, which obviously has been your focus since the winter, but prior to that, how did winning The Open change or not change your life and your game?

MATT FITZPATRICK: Yeah, obviously it changed my life massively. So many different aspects. You know, there's more demand on my time now, whether it's media from, like, this -- this is my first-ever press conference at the Masters, apart from when I was an amateur -- and then also sponsors. They want to use the time.

Before the U.S. Open, I had a lot of great sponsors, and they had time in their contract that they could use and I never ended up doing it. They didn't kind of want to follow up on it, which, you know, at the time for me was great.

But now, you know, totally understand and it's not an issue at all. It's just trying to manage my time as best that I can, and that's kind of been the biggest change.

Q. The weather forecast is a bit sketchy for this week. If it does cut up rough, how does that impact you, and do you think you're better suited, being a Yorkshireman, to cope with it than maybe some others?

MATT FITZPATRICK: I don't necessarily think I'm better suited. I mean, I think the condition of the golf course drastically changes. I imagine the SubAir will be on to try to keep it as firm as possible. But depending on how much rain there is, it's obviously always difficult.

I look at previous performances here when it's been really, really windy, really sort of cold, or where you've kind of got to be gritty, yeah, I would say that definitely suits me. Generic rain, I don't know if it suits anyone, really. I think everyone is miserable playing in that. I don't know. I wouldn't say that the rain suits me in any way in particular.

Q. You mentioned that was the first kind of proper injury you had. Given the time it came up, it would have been a bit of a challenge. Wonder if there was anyone you turned to to kind of help you with that mental side of it, maybe Billy or anybody else?

MATT FITZPATRICK: Definitely not Billy because Billy was like, "Oh, just get on with it." (Laughter.) Definitely not Billy.

But my coach, Mike Walker, has been fantastic in that. I work with a psychologist as well in the U.K., Robbie Anderson, and he's been very helpful, too. But Mike has been a big part of that. He's not just my coach, I've been with him since I was 14 years old, so we have a very close relationship as well, but he's very good psychologically and understands that. I think him being on the outside, he can kind of see what's going on, see how I'm dealing with things and know when to step in and have a conversation. So Mike's been really good for that.

Q. You go back to the U.S. Open last year, that was obviously the first time the LIV guys and the TOUR loyalists mixed together. Wondering if you were privy to any frosty exchanges or awkwardness or anything like that?

MATT FITZPATRICK: This week?

Q. No, Brookline.

MATT FITZPATRICK: Oh, no, no. Nothing.

Q. Nothing?

MATT FITZPATRICK: Nothing.

Q. Is there a different feeling in the air this week?

MATT FITZPATRICK: Not that I know of. I've said hello to everyone. It's been nice to see them (smiling).

Q. Did they say hello back?

MATT FITZPATRICK: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I have no issues.

Q. Do we know how you did the shoulder injury?

MATT FITZPATRICK: I don't know exactly. Obviously I've been doing the speed training for a long time, and the session I did before it flared up was probably three -- was actually three days before it did.

So this time, I wouldn't necessarily put it down to that. I don't know if I've done something in the gym, maybe exercise-wise, that kind of triggered it. I don't know if it's kind of -- it was just kind of hovering there and then something in the gym made it come out.

But I don't know what it is exactly. Like I say, it kind of took three weeks, really, to really diagnose the problem just because I was playing and it was getting better day-by-day, but really, really, really slowly, and that was kind of unusual, really.

Q. I know you've discussed it before, but could you just explain the origins of how as a youngster you got into analytics, even before you had access to all the vast amount that's available now?

MATT FITZPATRICK: Yeah, I think for me, I probably thought it was simpler than it actually is. I just got into the numbers and thought, well, okay, if I had just -- I'm better from eight-foot or if I'm better from ten-foot or if I can just hit it three-foot closer, X and Y are going to happen and I'm going to be a better player.

And I think I looked at it very black and white because I'm not going to go out tomorrow and just practice certain areas and they just all of a sudden get better. But I really enjoyed that, like if I improve these areas, I'm going to improve as a whole.

I think that just -- I enjoyed that. I was intrigued by it, and I think it just went from there, really.

Q. You have three 67s around here, your best scores. When you look back at those, what did you do well those days? What's the key to scoring around here for you?

MATT FITZPATRICK: I can't remember.

Q. Did you write everything down?

MATT FITZPATRICK: It's a long time ago. I can't remember when my last one was; do you know?

Q. Second round in 2019.

MATT FITZPATRICK: Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I just remember the first round being awful.

I can't think of anything in particular. I think what is underrated around here is driving the ball well. I think the fairways aren't necessarily tight, but I wouldn't necessarily say some of them are generous, either.

I do think it's important to be in position off the tee, maybe it's just me, but that's a big thing I notice around here when I play well is I drive the ball very well.

Going back to the stats, approach play and short game is key. You've got to hit it into the right spots on the green, hit it close, and also when you do hit a bad shot, you have to be on the right side of the green, the right misses, not short-sided, and then your short game comes into play.

I think those two are statistically the most important aspects of doing all well around here. If you look at the winners around here, they tend to be really, really good approach players and hit the ball well into the green that week. I think looking at those, those are the most important things.

Q. Everybody is getting asked their view on the new 13th tee, so what's yours?

MATT FITZPATRICK: It's great. It's fine. I don't really -- it's fine. The line obviously moves further right for me. If the conditions allow me to go for it, then I'll go for it. Then otherwise, probably be a lay up and just try and make a birdie that way.

Q. Just given that it's not ideal preparation for you, what does success look like at this year's Masters?

MATT FITZPATRICK: Making a cut would be a good start probably. But I think that is something that I've kind of done a little bit of work on myself to try and kind of say, well, it's early in the season. This is where I'm at with my game. Like my expectations have got to match that. My expectations in previous years, throughout my whole career, have been very high. I felt given the work that I put into my game, that's where I want to be.

But I think for me, you know, I definitely feel better physically. I definitely feel better mentally. I feel like my game is kind of slowly getting there, but at the same time I'm still in an early kind of, effectively, a rebuild phase of getting stronger and swinging it better.

So you know, I just think it's trying to take it day-by-day and kind of just getting better each day. That's kind of been the goal for me is just all I can do every day is what my coaches ask of me or what I want to achieve that day.

I think it's kind of just trying to keep my expectations at the right level to match where I'm currently at with my game.

Q. Are you in any pain?

MATT FITZPATRICK: Not right now, no. No, not right now.

Q. When you hit the ball?

MATT FITZPATRICK: When I hit the ball now, I'm fine. Yeah, probably the first three weeks, I probably -- PLAYERS was the first time that I could swing, drive it fully, and not feel it like in my backswing or follow-through. Everything before that, Pebble was really bad, and then Phoenix was not quite as bad but not great. The same the week after, slowly improving, basically.

But yeah, now I'm in better shape.

Q. If the U.S. Open had a Champions Dinner, what would be on your menu?

MATT FITZPATRICK: Is that copyright? I don't know. I've not thought of that. People ask me that about this place if I'm lucky enough to win. I'll never say until I actually do. It's like a superstition.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you very much and we all wish you the best of luck this week and hopefully that recovery process from the injury continues to get better and better.

MATT FITZPATRICK: Thank you.