MEIJER LPGA CLASSIC

June 16, 2023

Jennifer Kupcho

Blythefield Country Club

Quick Quotes

Q. All right, here with Jennifer Kupcho. Jennifer, just take me through some of the differences between first and second day here.

JENNIFER KUPCHO: Yeah, I mean, obviously an earlier start. Was a little bit tired at the beginning of the round. Yeah, wasn't hitting the ball as well as I was yesterday so kind of just battled my way through the round.

Q. When you say not hitting it as well, what were some of the spots you had to come up with some saves in your mind?

JENNIFER KUPCHO: I think I was just hitting my irons not at solid, not as far, because I wasn't hitting it solid. So it's hard to play through that. Wasn't really giving myself super good birdie chances. Had a lot of long birdie putts and not necessarily going to make those, so...

Q. When maybe you're not feeling that you're striking it as good as you want to, how much does it go back to the comfortability you have on this course, just to help you get through, as you say, grind it out?

JENNIFER KUPCHO: Yeah, I mean, obviously I played well last year, but definitely missed lots of greens around here. I've played here a lot. So just being comfortable with where the miss is and where to best leave it.

Q. Jennifer, maybe a little bit of a frustrating day today, but you used that frustration to kind of turn it around. I guess I would say that in jest. Did you utilize that frustration that you were feeling maybe somewhere around like 2 or 3 and have that jump start your round?

JENNIFER KUPCHO: Yeah, I mean, I was definitely more probably visually upset today, but really just tried to keep myself calm the best I could so I could come back. I knew that there was a lot of birdie holes coming up. The back nine has I would say a fair amount of harder holes, so just keeping myself calm to when I turned onto the front nine.

Q. How do you do that? I know there are a lot of golfers that struggle with that. How do you hone that in?

JENNIFER KUPCHO: I think it's just a lot of practice. I didn't used to be super good at that, so it's just really like all a mental game and trying to just calm myself down.

Q. Last year obviously you won. I'm sure you've been hearing a lot about that. Now that you're actually in the event, what's it going to take to get to that final Sunday and be in the race for winning here again?

JENNIFER KUPCHO: Yeah, I mean, I haven't looked at leaderboards so I don't know what's out there today, but I think it's definitely scorable. Obviously I know Saturday is always moving day so it will be really scorable tomorrow.

I just got to come out and play a good round.

Q. How big a part of playing here is getting the par-5s and getting after those?

JENNIFER KUPCHO: Quite a bit. I would say the par-5s are the long but shorter holes for me, and I can get to most of them.

So really just try to take those to my advantage and get myself in a comfortable spot.

Q. You had four birdies today, I think. How many were you getting home?

JENNIFER KUPCHO: I think the only one I didn't get to was No. 4. Actually I laid up on 10 as well. Sorry.

Q. I think one more. You talked a little bit about tomorrow is definitely moving day; scorable opportunities. How will you take this afternoon to reset? Do you go to the range? Do you work on what you were finding wasn't working out there today?

JENNIFER KUPCHO: I probably won't hit the range. I'd really like to hit the range, but I'll probably go putt a few. I struggled a little bit with my putting keeping it online, so probably do that and just rest.

It's already been a long week, so rest.

Fastscripts by ASAP Sports...