MASTERS TOURNAMENT

April 8, 2024

Neal Shipley

Quick Quotes

Q. Did you have this day arranged with Dunlap?

NEAL SHIPLEY: I didn't have it arranged initially. Saw him today, and we decided to go out and play. I actually texted him last night and told him I'd like a little bit of a rematch, so it was a fun day to be out there with him. He's such a great guy. Really enjoyed it.

Q. How did the rematch go?

NEAL SHIPLEY: It went good. It was good.

Q. For you?

NEAL SHIPLEY: Yeah. But he's playing great right now, and it's good to play with guys who are playing well and able to win on TOUR. You get to see what his game is like.

He's such a good putter, and being around him today gives me a good appreciation for what he can do with that club.

Q. The whole whirlwind experience of being here, are you ready?

NEAL SHIPLEY: Yeah. I feel ready. It's not -- obviously a little bit of nerves over the first tee shot of the day, but having crowds here, it's fun. I like to feed off this energy and just really enjoy the moment. I don't feel uncomfortable at all.

Q. Going back to the Am, going into the final, is this, okay, I'm in the final, but I'm going to Augusta?

NEAL SHIPLEY: Yeah, after my semifinal match and getting through that, obviously you want to win the final, but the U.S. Amateur is definitely the best tournament in the world to finish second in, there's no doubt about that.

Q. Your caddie, can you tell that story again, childhood friend?

NEAL SHIPLEY: Yes, he's a childhood friend. I've known him since he was about 10, I was about 13. We grew up playing at the same club, St. Clair Country Club, just south of Pittsburgh, and yeah, we've been friends for 10 years now. We've played a ton of golf together. Just really happy to have him here and share the experience with him. He's just such a good guy and one of my closest friends.

Q. Did you have some sort of an agreement if he ever got here you would be on the bag?

NEAL SHIPLEY: No, never an agreement like that. I actually really surprised him over Thanksgiving when I told him I wanted him on the bag. We had a cool moment there when we were both home.

Q. You and Carter went out early this morning, just the two of you, played as a solo, first group off, 8:00 a.m. You've taken plenty of visits here, obviously, but what surprised you this morning about conditions at the course? What did you work on and talk about the most?

NEAL SHIPLEY: It's starting to get crispy out there. I don't know if they're starting to get this firm within anticipation of the weather coming on Thursday, but it's getting firm. It's fast. It's going to get firmer and faster these next two days. That just makes hitting greens really important and just working on your landing spots on chipping and your second shots in because landing spots are starting to get pretty small with it being this crispy. Certain greens are getting really firm like 2, 3 and a few others. Those are the ones on the front that I really noticed.

Q. Compared to what you imagined about Augusta and what you visualized before, what surprised you the most here this week?

NEAL SHIPLEY: All my visits I took here, I was kind of surprised actually with the greens, how sloped the edges are, but also it seemed like every green had a good amount of flat space in it, too, which I had always imagined that was just a lot of slope everywhere. That was a pleasant surprise because I felt like there was actually places you could hit your golf ball to.

But then being here today, it's just how the patrons frame the golf course. It's so cool. Holes like 2 are just completely different when the patrons are all around it. I'm really happy to have them all here, and it's exciting to have all the crowds and hearing roars down 16 from the ball skips and everything. It's cool.

Q. I think the veterans always talk about the amount of different shots that you can hit and should hit here. How many shots do you have in your toolbox and how many are you using here?

NEAL SHIPLEY: Gosh, around the greens there's just tons of different shots, high, low, putting draw or cut spin on different shots just to kind of fit what the golf course gives you. Off the tee it's really -- a straight ball works out here everywhere pretty much, but you've got to be able to work it a little bit both ways if you want to optimize yourself on some of the holes.

I feel prepared to hit all those shots. I'm really an experienced tournament player, especially at the amateur level, and I've had to deal with conditions and hitting all these different shots before under pressure. This week is going to be no different. It's just golf. But definitely a little different being out here.

Q. Your run up to this week, when did you first come here? How many practice rounds did you play? How did you plan that?

NEAL SHIPLEY: Yeah, well, I always knew I probably wanted to play at least 36 holes before the tournament started, so I was going to try and knock out 18 today or tomorrow. I kind of figured just try to get 18 out of the way and get some rest these next few days and recovery before Thursday, so that's kind of where we started.

I got here on Saturday afternoon and kind of got settled in, got my feet under me, went to the range for a little bit, and yesterday was kind of like a course scouting day. We walked the course with the range finder and got all the information we needed for there.

Q. You're staying up there?

NEAL SHIPLEY: Yeah, I am tonight.

Q. You've been up there?

NEAL SHIPLEY: I have not been up there yet. I've heard it's tight quarters, but I'm pretty excited about it. I think I have Christo Lamprecht with me, so we've got two tall guys up there, and I hear the beds are pretty small, so that should be interesting for us.

Q. Did you make any other visits the past few months?

NEAL SHIPLEY: Yeah, I made a visit on Easter.

Q. You also have -- do you have college still?

NEAL SHIPLEY: Yeah, I'm finishing up a graduate certificate right now. It's my third degree actually. We're enjoying that. It's a little less intensive than some of our other stuff, so it's been nice to be able to focus on golf.

Q. Are you a western Pennsylvania guy?

NEAL SHIPLEY: Yes, I am.

Q. I would suspect Palmer is sort of a part of your -- have you checked into his history here? Are you into that?

NEAL SHIPLEY: Yeah, I'm aware of what Mr. Palmer has done here and how special this place was to him. I believe he's one of the champions that was a member, as well, I think along with Nicklaus. He's got a cool history here, and obviously he means a lot to my home area, and what his foundation is doing now, as well, with their work with youth and their initiatives with outdoor initiatives and other initiatives through golf, it's really cool what they're doing to provide better outcomes for some young kids where they do their work.

Good friends with the foundation, and yeah, just -- Mr. Palmer is the GOAT in western Pennsylvania. There's no other way to put it.