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BELLSOUTH CLASSICMarch 29, 2006Chris DiMarcoDULUTH, GEORGIA PHIL STAMBAUGH: Talk about coming back to Atlanta to play in this event and getting ready for the Masters. CHRIS DiMARCO: It's always a great tune up for Augusta. Green speeds are very similar, and obviously the weather, you're really talking a couple hundred miles, not even, east of here. So, you know, it's always a great tune up and I always like playing and look forward to playing in Atlanta. PHIL STAMBAUGH: You were not able to play in THE PLAYERS Championship, maybe just a little bit about your health and what happened there. CHRIS DiMARCO: Yeah, it was about 50 percent precautionary as it was 50 percent injury. If I would have had to have teed it up on Thursday, I probably could have. I definitely didn't want to go in that rough and have to pull something and maybe be out for two or three months. It was as much precautionary as it was injury. I feel a lot better out there today. I feel great out there today, so the injury is gone. PHIL STAMBAUGH: Maybe summarize your year to this point. CHRIS DiMARCO: Well, I won overseas, so I played well there. And I've only played five tournaments on this tour. I've had some good finishes and a 30th at Doral. I've played well. I just haven't really gotten in the mix of things yet on Sunday. I put myself in position but I haven't quite gotten there. Q. You mentioned this being a tune up for Augusta. Can you look ahead to next year when the tournament moves to May? How do you think that will affect the tournament? CHRIS DiMARCO: Well, I think the weather will be better for sure. It will be warmer. And obviously I think you'll see the same amount of guys nobody is going to change their preparation. I think you'll see guys that like to play before big tournaments play and guys who don't, don't. Q. Before you played Augusta for the first time, did you know that it would set up for you as well as it does, did you have an inkling at all? CHRIS DiMARCO: I think if you're a golfer and you've grown up watching Augusta, I don't think even your first time, I think you know all the intricacies of the golf course. Certainly, you know, I've watched over the years and I know that on 16, you hit it up to the right. Certain things, you try not to putt yourself into. You see the big number that is they shoot and you try to stay away from there. It used to set up really good for me until they keep adding hundreds and hundreds of yards to it. Some of the holes out there are ridiculous and it seems like they are just wanting one type of player there. There's no rough, so it doesn't really matter where you hit it. It tends to be a bomber's course now. I putted extremely well last year to have a chance to win. Q. Have you played it since the changes have been made? CHRIS DiMARCO: I heard the 7th hole 7th hole is what I heard. 11 was fine last year. I think we hit 2 and 3 irons in there last year. I don't understand the philosophy by having us have 508 yards to that hole, especially when you have a big mound right short, and now you'll have shots that land in that mound that can kick back and go in the water. It's a really, really hard hole. I haven't played it. Last year I smoked a driver and 5 iron to about 30 feet short. Last year it was a driver and a 9 iron, driver, 8 iron. This year, it's going to be a driver and probably a 4 iron, 5 iron, depending on the wind. Q. Not many people are complaining about the fourth hole, but will that be difficult, as well? CHRIS DiMARCO: The thing that they do there is they don't they take the old tee out. You could at least leave the old tee there. At least you can go back to that old tee. Guys are putting different clubs in their bags on certain holes. It's probably going to be a perfect 5 wood for me, just hit it up high and soft and somehow tried to get in there. That bunker short is not necessarily the worst place to be. You. Q. Hope this isn't belaboring the fact, but that 16th hole changed everything last year on the last day, you had a good view of it, and still you were tied, could you describe how that 16th hole, the emotions of what happens, the changes? CHRIS DiMARCO: Well, I mean, you know, I felt certainly like I had the advantage when we walked off the tee. One down and he's got essentially a really, really difficult golf shot, which he did have and I've got a 15 , 16 footer up the hill. When he made it, you know, you've just got to the good news was that it was really loud there for a couple of minutes, so that let's you get over that emotion and say, hey, we've still got to concentrate and win the tournament. Still one back with two to go, I was ready to hit the putt. It was certainly unexpected, but I've been working with guy oh valiant a and we've talked about that, you have to expect the unexpected out there. Certainly wasn't ready for it but I knew how to handle it. Q. Nearly a year on, would you say your near miss at Augusta, has it changed you as a person or your approach to the game? CHRIS DiMARCO: No. I mean, you know, certain courses fit certain people, and that course just off the tee and everything just kind of fits my eye real well. You know, it's one of those courses where you have to be real precise with your irons, and I've always been a good iron player. My distance control is real good. It just suits my eye. I like the greens being that fast. I love when they get that fast. I really tend to see the holes better and the lines better and use a lot more imagination. Q. You went head to head with one of the two greatest players ever, eyeball to eyeball and you came very close, did that raise your confidence level, or was it more disappointing? CHRIS DiMARCO: Oh, it raised my confidence level. Any time you can compete at that tournament to win, that is our biggest stage and you're playing against our greatest player and you stand up and go toe to toe with him, obviously you pull some confidence out of there. Every time I'm struggling, I look back to Augusta and go, gosh, if you can do it there, you can do it anywhere. I won at Phoenix; if you can win there, you can win anywhere. It's just a matter of I know I've been there, so I mean, if I have a chance to win again, I know what the feelings are and I know how to handle it. That's all you can try to do is learn from near misses. Q. What are your thoughts, this is the 10th year this will be played at this course, what do you think of the layout? CHRIS DiMARCO: It's good to see the dormant zoysia, I guess, is what they used to have in the rough. It's nice to see green grass in there because you actually get some roll now. You don't get the mud balls you used to get and obviously aesthetically it looks a lot better. This is a great golf course. Like I said it's a great tune up for Augusta, you have to hit a lot of shots, a lot of little draws and cuts. It's one that you really have to work your ball around the golf course. Q. Obviously you never like to miss a week when you're planning on playing, but after seeing the carnage at Sawgrass, is it a benefit maybe that you didn't go? CHRIS DiMARCO: Certainly not. Obviously I've love to I missed our championship, and that hurt. Like I said, two or three more days and I would have been good to go. That rough there, I was talking to my caddie and I asked him and he said it was brutal. Knowing me as a competitor, I wasn't going to just chip out. If I felt like I could get it to the green I would try it. I was afraid of long term injury. I was afraid of having something that would last one week if I tried to go back too early could last me three or four months and that's something I didn't want to do. We're going right into the major season right now. I want to make sure I'm ready for all of it. Q. A lot of people asked after Doral, you know, why guys this has happened before, why guys go on vacations, knowing in another three or four weeks you're going into the major season, they question that; and I'm not questioning that, but just asking you what the thought process was? CHRIS DiMARCO: The fact that I have a family and I have kids and we like to take family vacations like everybody else. It's part of the chance you have to take. It's the first time in three years and it's a fluky thing that happened. I could have walked out in my garage and tripped over something and banged my knee on something, injury is going to happen. I had a great time that week, unfortunately I did miss the tournament. It's the first one I've ever had to miss because of an injury. So looking back, I would not have changed anything. I'm going to go next year, too. That's the way it's going to be. Maybe obviously I may be a bit more tentative maybe, but other than that I'm still going to go out and have a good time. You've got to live your life. I don't want to look back when I'm 50 and miss all those years I could have spent with my kids on vacation. Q. So can you understand why Stephen Ames could actually have missed Augusta? CHRIS DiMARCO: No, I don't understand that at all to tell you the truth. I thought he could have handled that question a little bit better. I like Stephen, he's a good guy, but I would have shown a little bit more excitement about getting into Augusta. CHRIS DiMARCO: I was wearing a backpack, a couple of guys were coming out of the trees and I didn't see them really and the only way to avoid them was for me to go down myself and I had sunglass cases and my phone in there and one of them, on my lower wrist. Originally I was like, my shoulders, my knees are good, nothing was cracked or broken, just sore, really, really sore. I saw a doctor out in Colorado and one on Monday when I went back. Q. Will there be a void next week without Jack anything laws? CHRIS DiMARCO: Absolutely. I don't think anybody could think about Augusta National without think about him. I think if you ask anybody that has ever watched that tournament to remember one shot, I would say 95 percent well, before last year, 95 percent of the people would have say something about Jack and the shot that he hit; whether it was '86 or whether it was the one where he made it up the hill on 16, whatever it was. There's so many. And he certainly I like the comments that him and Mr. Palmer said about Augusta. He certainly has the right to have an opinion on what has been done at that course. CHRIS DiMARCO: I'm very excited we're in the Final Four. They are playing as a team and George Mason is doing the same thing, they are a team, they are a team that's unselfish. It's going to be a great game. There's a reason why George Mason beat North Carolina, Michigan State and Connecticut; because they play as a team. |
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