U.S. SENIOR OPEN CHAMPIONSHIP

June 29, 2024

Richard Bland

Newport Country Club

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: Please welcome Richard Bland to the interview room here at the 44th U.S. Senior Open hosted at Newport Country Club. Richard, 1-under 69 today. Pretty active card. Can you just talk us through your round.

RICHARD BLAND: Yeah, I started okay and not great in the middle and finished better.

Yeah, pretty frustrated. I left way too many out there today. A couple of bunker shots that you shoot up-and-down 100 times out of 100, and I didn't get them up-and-down. Make a couple of bogeys in there, which you're always going to do.

Yeah, I've probably -- I wouldn't say I've played my way out, but I've made it very difficult for tomorrow.

Q. What did you do on 15 to kind of turn around your back nine?

RICHARD BLAND: I don't know. I just kind of -- it's just kind of one of those putts. I kind of -- yeah, I probably wasn't in the best frame of mind. I just thought, you know what, I'm just going to go straight. It was one of those. It was either going to be a one-putt or a three-putt. Fortunately it was one.

Then, yeah, kind of it feels like you get the momentum back a little bit there. Then don't make up-and-down on 16, which again like -- Amesy was literally 18 inches from the ball. I hit it to eight feet past the hole down the hill.

So, yeah, just -- mistakes really that I shouldn't really be making. That's what really frustrates me.

Q. Understand the frustration, but finishing with a birdie on 18, talk us through that one.

RICHARD BLAND: Yeah, just kind of a perfect 9-iron up the hill. Wind off the right. Just kind of stand up there and hit it kind of 15 feet right of the flag and kind of let the wind do it and the slope.

Fortunately, it came out pretty good, sort of five feet. Maybe that will be an important birdie. Who knows. We'll see.

I got a bit of work to do this afternoon. You've got Greeny obviously who's playing great at the minute. Steve Stricker's been there, done it. I don't know too much about the guy that's in front, but he's pretty much had the lead all week.

I'm going to need something like I did at Harbor Shores. I'm going to have to shoot somewhere in the very low 60s, I think 63, 64, to have any chance tomorrow.

If I just cut out the mistakes like I did today, which I haven't done over the first two days, then I've got a chance to do that, depending on what they do.