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THE TOUR CHAMPIONSHIP

November 4, 2005

Bart Bryant

ATLANTA, GEORGIA

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Bart Bryant, thanks for joining us here, tied with Retief Goosen after 36 holes here at the TOUR Championship. Maybe talk about your day. You struggled a little bit there on the back nine and then came back with an eagle for the second straight day on 15. Obviously really helped out your day.

BART BRYANT: Yeah, the eagle on 15 was huge. I actually really struggled from No. 8 all the way through about 13, I think. It was kind of a rough stretch of holes. I didn't feel like I was doing anything particularly bad. I made one real bad swing on No. 9 on my second shot. That was just to dump it in the bunker there was pretty pitiful.

Other than that, I didn't think I did anything crazy, but it just wasn't getting it in the hole like I was the day before. 15 kind of righted the ship.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Looking at the history of this tournament, your brother led this tournament in 1995 off 36 holes and ended up finishing I believe tied for 7th, so you've got a little bit of history on your side there. Have you talked much with your brother about playing the TOUR Championship.

BART BRYANT: I haven't talked to him at all about it to be honest with you. I played with him at Disney and he kind of congratulated me. Of course, at that point I wasn't sure, positive, I'd get in. He kind of congratulated me, pre congratulated me on maybe getting in. We didn't talk much about it. I think he may have finished runner up one year.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: He finished tied for 3rd one year I think in '94 and then finished tied for 7th in 95.

Q. Everybody keeps saying that you're supposed to play this golf course out of the fairway, and the two guys, Retief and Tiger, closest to you, are last and second to last in fairways in reg. It seems like there's two ways of playing golf, either obliterate it and play it out of the rough or play the way you do.

BART BRYANT: There's one way to play for me, and that's in the fairway. If I hit it in the rough, I'm in big trouble. Those guys can hit it an awful long way, and they're so strong that they can hit out of that rough and get it to the green.

Q. You talked about yesterday feeling like you belong, whether you did, whether you didn't. After a day like today in the last group, do you feel it even more one way or the other?

BART BRYANT: No. I mean, hopefully I'll prove it to myself. I'm gaining a lot of valuable experience. It's just kind of uncharted territory for me today, being kind of having that big a lead that early in the tournament, kind of learning how to pace myself, realizing that I have I'm not even halfway done with the tournament, learning how to deal with that, with the emotions. There's a lot of stuff going on, and in one way it was weird because it almost felt like I was in the last day of a golf tournament, and I shouldn't feel that way. So I still have a lot to learn.

Hopefully I didn't spend too much energy today playing that round because I have so far to go.

Q. You had another fast start I heard you say on the outside podium. You threatened to shoot four 62s yesterday as a joke. Were images of crazy numbers dancing in your head at that point, too?

BART BRYANT: Maybe they were. Maybe that's what got me. When I got to 3 under after 7, and 8 and 9 were really birdie holes today, then all of a sudden I'm thinking, okay, birdie at 8, 9, 5 under, and then I started counting and you shouldn't do that in this game. That may be what got me.

Q. The season is coming to a close. All the majors have been played and people now know you, recognize you. Does this tournament now become like a really nice consolation prize or become your own personal major?

BART BRYANT: You know, it depends on what minute you talk to me. Sometimes I feel like, boy, this is just a great bonus, I'm happy to be here, life is great, this is so much fun, and no matter what happens it's a great year, just great to be here. And then a minute later, I'm look, "boy, come on, you've got to focus, you've got to try to win this golf tournament. This is what it's all about. You're here, you have a chance." But the funny thing is, you know, that loose attitude of being here and enjoying it and saying, hey, I've got everything to gain and nothing to lose, that's not a bad way to play. I think I may have played that way a lot yesterday. There wasn't much on the line.

I think today I kind of slipped in and out of those two things, and I think there's a happy medium there. I need to be focused and I need to relax and enjoy it and realize that I'm in a great golf tournament. But at the end of the week, it's a great year. No matter what happens, I'm proud to have done what I've done this year. But I'd sure like to finish it up strong.

Q. I was trying to think of anybody else out here that I was aware of that has had elbow surgery as a result of wear and tear, and you've had it on both elbows. We all know about the wrists and we all know about the back. How do you blow out two elbows?

BART BRYANT: You know what, I think it comes from a long, long time of swinging the club really, really bad (laughter). You know, I grew up playing men's clubs when I was like 19 years old, and the only thing I could do was kind of hold it in my right hand, so I learned to lay the club off really bad. I've been trying to overcome that my whole life. But I think that put a lot of pressure on parts of my body that shouldn't have, and I'm sure that just years and years of wear and tear and growing up in Mexico and hitting as many balls as I did didn't help, and I think eventually I'm not like the most physically fit specimen, either, so there wasn't a lot of muscles surrounding those elbows.

Q. How frightening of a thought is it that through two rounds Tiger is even on par 5s going into the weekend, and where he is?

BART BRYANT: He's always there (laughter). It doesn't matter whether he's 2 over what is he, 7 under? If he was even, he's going to be in there on the last nine holes. He just finds a way, he's that good. You know, I can't really concern myself with that. Obviously if he played the par 5s well, he'd probably be leading the tournament because he can certainly reach 9 and obviously 15, if he drives it perfect there, he's probably hitting a 6 iron there.

If he plays the par 5s well, he could be leading, and he may do it on the weekend and he may go crazy. The best I can do is hit it in the fairway, knock it on the green and try and make a few putts.

Q. Would you kind of run through the eagle and where it came in your round? Did it mean a little bit more than just two shots?

BART BRYANT: Probably so, to answer the last half of that question. To have it to 3 under and then for that to put me to 2 under, it felt like, okay, I didn't lose that much. So I think for me it was almost more important than two shots. It kind of got me back, separated a little bit, got me at least up there with Retief. So I felt like at the end of the day, the eagle kind of brought me along.

I ended up hitting a 3 iron in there from about 205 yards. It almost felt like a little too much club. I think the ball may have rolled up kind of close to the back of the green and then rolled down because I got a very delayed clap. I actually hit some really good putts on the back nine. Came close and couldn't get one in. I almost had a feeling before I putted that that that might be one to make up for some of those that got close.

Q. Had you ever played with The Goose before? We know him as a guy that doesn't talk much. Did he talk much?

BART BRYANT: We talked about twice, not for long. He's kind of a quiet I'll tell you, he's the nicest guy in the world, and if you do bring up a conversation with him, he'll talk to you briefly. Very nice guy, just doesn't say much. I have played with him before. I played with him at the Buick just outside of at Warwick Hills, Flint, and he was good. I felt very inferior when I played with him the first time. There were a couple long par 5s there I was busting it twice to about 50 yards and he was carving 4 woods in there to about five feet. He's a great player.

Q. What kind of conversation would you initiate? Did you ask him why he doesn't talk as much?

BART BRYANT: I didn't feel like that was probably the appropriate question, but I asked him he asked me, he brought up where are you living, and I asked him later on about the age of his kids, weather type questions, stuff that doesn't really mean a whole lot, just chitchat.

Q. I was just curious, the feeling you've had going into the weekend, having shot 68 and at 10 under with Retief but having been where you were headed to 8, at one point you're 5, you wind up even, does that change the way you feel going into the weekend?

BART BRYANT: Not really. I'm happy to be at 10 under and happy to be tied for the lead. At one point I had a five shot lead. I wasn't really paying attention. I didn't realize I had quite that big a lead. I did realize when I was back to even, all of a sudden pretty quickly

Q. What made you realize that?

BART BRYANT: I saw the leaderboard I think when I went back to 8. Retief birdied to go to 8, and I saw on our board, we were tied with each other, and then on that green I saw a leaderboard and saw at that point there were two 8s and maybe a couple 7s, and at that point I said, you know what, I'm tied for the lead at a great golf tournament against a great field, I've hit some great shots this week and I've hit some bad shots, but where I am right now is not a bad place to be, let's focus and let's go on from here. Let's not think about what happened previous, the good or the bad.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Bart, thanks.

End of FastScripts.

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