U.S. GIRLS' JUNIOR CHAMPIONSHIP

July 20, 2023

Farah O'Keefe

USAF Academy Eisenhower Golf Club

Press Conference

Q. How did the weather delay affect you at all today? I think you were on the 4th hole.

FARAH O'KEEFE: Yeah, I think I got a 1-up lead on 3. She made an unfortunate bogey. Yeah, I was kind of almost like, when you're going for a weather delay you have to reset completely and refocus. I think that I had a really good second warm-up or, I guess, third warm-up of the day. Then I kind of just got back out there. I knew what shot I had in to 14. I was lucky she kind of caught hers a little thin.

I don't know, I just picked up some momentum towards the back, towards the end of the back nine. I got my putter going towards the end. That kind of helped out. But, yeah, I think the rain delay is definitely challenging, but you really just have to reset and refocus.

Q. How much did the experience of playing at Pebble help you coming into this week? You're around all that hoopla, I don't know who you played practice rounds with, but it's got to be a confidence booster, no matter what you do there.

FARAH O'KEEFE: Yeah, I got to play a couple with Jin Young and I picked up on a lot of little things that the pros do. And I didn't play too well at Pebble, but it was a really good learning experience and I think I kind of, I definitely kind of picked up on some mental things that maybe I was lacking in. It was really helpful to watch Allisen come down the stretch and kind of look at what she did differently to what I was doing. It was really tiny stuff, but that's the difference between 9-under and 11-over. (Laughing.)

Q. Have you had one semester at Texas then?

FARAH O'KEEFE: Yes.

Q. But you didn't play on the team.

FARAH O'KEEFE: I was redshirting. So I was practicing with the team and all that kind of stuff, but I didn't compete.

Q. Was that a conscious decision to enrol early?

FARAH O'KEEFE: Yeah, yes. I took 10 classes my first semester of my senior year at high school. It was a lot.

Q. Where did you go to high school?

FARAH O'KEEFE: Anderson in Austin.

Q. You have your coach on the bag. He won a USGA title with Sophia six years ago. How much does that, are you leaning on him as this week?

FARAH O'KEEFE: He's really phenomenal. He's been giving me really, really good numbers. We kind of, the first two days stroke play it's kind of a little experimentation of like what exactly works, because I never had him on the bag before. We kind of figured out that I needed to read my own putts. That way I got a better speed on 'em. We just kind of like made little teeny, tiny adjustments from round to round. But he's really solid. He's gotten me to kick into gear a couple of times where maybe I lost focus. He's just phenomenal. He's a really good caddie.

Q. How about adjusting to the golf course. Obviously you don't play at much altitude in Texas. Have you kind of figured things out now that you've had four, five days here?

FARAH O'KEEFE: Yeah, I'm lucky that we're traveling with the Trackman, so I was able to kind of get some numbers on the range before every round. But, yeah, it's kind of interesting because if you compress one really hard you can get an extra 15 yards out of it. So it's really, you have to have a lot of feel, especially with the 10 percent or whatever it is. It can be 12 or 15, depending upon how you smoke it.

Q. Probably nice to get your match done. You don't have to come out too early tomorrow. You're going to have an early tee time, but not that early.

FARAH O'KEEFE: Yeah, I know. It's kind of shocking to see like a 7 a.m. tee time, but it's also, it's a big advantage over everybody else who is going to have to finish up in the morning.