DORAL-RYDER OPEN

March 1, 2000

Greg Norman

GREG NORMAN: I have to tee off in a while. (Laughs).

GREG NORMAN: Everything has been going very well, thanks, Lee. Been very busy off the golf course, spent a lot of time down in Australia. Pretty much since I have been home focusing on practicing and playing and trying to get ready for this tournament and four in a row which I am playing two weeks after this.

GREG NORMAN: Starting TPC, I play TPC Bell South, Masters, Heritage.

GREG NORMAN: Bay Hill, no.

GREG NORMAN: That has been fairly easy. Since that interview I have spent a lot more time on the golf course just practicing, getting ready. My trip down to Australia trip where you have to do a lot of business at the same time trying to play golf. I kind of liked to write that one off. That was the only trip that I was making down there of any extended period. Right now I have a lot of opportunity of spending plenty of time on the golf course focusing on what I need. I have hardly been in the office to tell you the truth - Mike will be able to tell you that - but I think I have been in there, about a couple of days. If I do go in there I go on the weekends when I get a little quiet spare time. So I have made that commitment. I maintained that commitment so now just got to try and produce the results from it.

GREG NORMAN: Yeah, this golf course is probably in the best condition I have ever seen it, I think few of the players mentioned that yesterday. No question, it is prime, prime shape. Everything around Doral depends on the weather. If you get the wind blowing fairly strong out of the south, south east, that type of direction, this golf course plays very, very difficult. And that will obviously dictate the scores. The changes that were made out there which I am sure that is what you are referencing to, I think the changes are probably getting it back more to the way Doral was. And then talking with Raymond Floyd, they asked Raymond to toughen Doral up. He did that, no question about it. Now they got it back to where it is more acceptable to the Doral eye, the way the players feel - I think right across the board it has been a fairly positive response. Throwing on top of that a condition, especially South Florida this time of year, we have had great growing season all winter which has been a huge asset to this far south, and throwing in the great condition of the golf course and the playability coming back to where we remember it, I think the guys are speaking very highly of it.

GREG NORMAN: It looked so different because there was a lot of sand out there. It didn't have the characteristic look to the eye that we are obviously used to playing. Raymond did what he needed to do - toughen the golf course up. From the eye standpoint, it didn't look to me as pleasing as what it is or is now and what it was prior.

GREG NORMAN: I think we are very good wind players, for one. We play in a lot of wind in Australia; week in, week out, very seldom do we actually have a day like this. It is normally blowing 15 to 20 knots down there every time we tee it up. Bermuda greens, we really -- I grew up on fairly course Bermuda greens, so I remember those. And I have a Bermuda green putting green in the back of my house so I putt on that type of grass all the time. I think it is just the heat, the palm trees, that type of feel, and probably more so the wind, we are very, very comfortable in that. When you are comfortable playing in a lot of wind it is a big advantage.

GREG NORMAN: Come to live here?

GREG NORMAN: No, I just wanted to live in Florida because it reminded me so much of home, the ocean, both sides, the hot weather in the wintertime. I am not a big love of cold, cold weather day in, day out. And the feel of this is how I grew up in Australia, so I like this type of atmosphere. I love the humidity. So on top of all that, the golf courses are very good down here. It was an easy decision for me, but it wasn't just predicated on because of the golf courses.

GREG NORMAN: Very little. Pretty much the Titleist clubs I am using right now, identical feel, and looking to my old Cobra golf clubs wasn't any difference. The only difference I had in making adjustment to was the driver. I am still making a few. I learned yesterday a couple of things about my driver, so it takes you a long period of time to really get adjusted to a golf club, but that is about it. Everything else has been pretty much status quo. The golf ball, a little bit of difference with the golf ball. I found that the golf ball I am using now is probably a little bit more consistent shot after shot into the wind. That is about it, but distance-wise, not much difference.

GREG NORMAN: I use that Professional 90.

GREG NORMAN: I do. Every now then I will go. I may go this year mainly because of the changes. I heard they made 6 or 7 changes to some of the greens there, so I might go and take a look at those. If I do that, it will be in that two-week stretch; in the next couple of weeks just run up there. I always check the weather out and see if it is worth going up or not. I hadn't been up for the last couple of years, but mainly because of so many changes, subtle changes to the golf course. I think two days is not going to be enough to get to see.

GREG NORMAN: During the tournament you can get on any time.

GREG NORMAN: Yeah, you are kind of an honorary member for that 12-month time period from the time you -- like if you qualify from last year, you are an honorary member all the way up there. If you get invited to play, the day you get an invitation, you can go play, so...

GREG NORMAN: No. You can't bring guests. They are not that generous. (laughs).

GREG NORMAN: I like the state of my game actually. I feel very relaxed, very comfortable with it. I don't find that there is any nagging little problems within my swing. I think the only problems that I am having is probably my concentration and the focus, but if I just -- I mean, alleviating a lot of other things, just focusing on golf like I have done for the last couple of weeks, I shouldn't have a problem getting it out of my system as well.

GREG NORMAN: I am talking five, six hours a day normal stuff that I did. Not the 10-hour day sessions, but five, six-hour sessions - that is a lot.

GREG NORMAN: Well, if you just stand there and hit balls in that time period, probably going to be like 600 balls - about 100 balls an hour, you can pretty much get through. I don't just stand there and pound balls. I chip and putt; break it up a little bit; go hit some other clubs. It is a segmented practice session - two hours doing this, and two hours doing that, and two hours maybe on the short game and putting, so I pretty much break it up. That was the way I used to practice, break it up into segments. I pretty much went back to my old routine just to get into the flow of it again.

GREG NORMAN: I think it is one of the few businesses in the world where you get a 20% growth rate year after year. The popularity of the game has shown that; not just in the professional corporate level, but also in the growth of social golf and number of rounds being played. I have said this for 20 years: We are very, very fortunate to be involved with a game that has that sustaining power and continual growth factor that we have in the game of golf. I think everybody recognizes and we all do our part to try and maintain it. No question about that. The popularity of the game is high and I think always has been high for since the day of the Nelsons and the Sneads and the Hogans all the way up to the Nicklaus and Palmers into this new generation of players. I think if you go back and just equate it out, I think the popularity is just on a steady, steady growth rate.

GREG NORMAN: Yes. Absolutely, no question. If they don't, they better. I think if there are individuals out there like that, then they are in a very, very small minority. I think everybody appreciates the evolution of the game; whether it is the amateur ranks with the Jones of the world, all the way through the professional ranks, up to where we are today. I think they got to be pretty naive in their heads saying if they don't know what has taken place to get them where they are right now. I think the most important factor is that they understand that the responsibility now is their responsibility, maintaining that, and keeping that going on for the next couple of generations. Because you have always got to think two generations on; not just one because there is always a process of a roll-over taking place. You have always got to make sure that you are thinking far enough down the line to maintain it.

GREG NORMAN: I personally won't be making the trip because I go down there just the week -- two weeks earlier. Then I am coming home for Christmas. Then I got to turn around, go all the way back two days after Christmas. Then I got to come home back here; then go all the way back again two weeks later. I don't think I am going to be a yo-yo going across the Pacific that much.

GREG NORMAN: I couldn't. I couldn't because I have so many other commitments that I have already set in stone many years ahead and to have this thrown in right over New Year's Eve and New Year because I have to go back in the middle -- I always go back there around the middle of January. So if I go down there and stay -- start of the Andersen and stay, then I am going to be in Australia for five, six weeks. I don't want to do that. I have been a believer never being away more than two, three weeks maximum away from the family, and I am not going to change that. So it is a very awkward period of time.

GREG NORMAN: That time of year I think it is because Australia is an extremely long way to go. I have done it enough for 20 odd years; I know what it takes out of you, and to get all the way down there and get knocked out in the first round is another thing. If it was a 72 stroke-play event, maybe a different story because you can hang around there for five, six days. You have got to leave -- if you want to get there on a Tuesday, you got to leave on a Sunday. So you lose a day going down there, so no matter what your time schedule is to get in, you have got to leave a day earlier. So that extra day makes the week an 8-day week instead of 7- or 6-day week. So it just backs up your schedule closer and closer to Christmas and New Years, so you really don't get a whole lot of time off.

GREG NORMAN: Well, it is a long way to go. It is a player's decision. I am just talking about myself. I am not going to make that trip for that reason. Not specifically for that but for other reasons as well. And the other -- don't forget the tournament starts on a Wednesday, too, so to get -- these guys never have seen Metropolitan Golf Club, I would say a high majority of the 64 players playing it, so maybe 55 haven't seen it so to get two good rounds under your belt, you have got to get there Monday. To get there Monday, you have got to leave Saturday; maybe even Friday night from the East Coast so you have got to leave a long way early to get in there. What is the date of the tournaments?

GREG NORMAN: So you are talking about leaving --

GREG NORMAN: 28th of December, three days after Christmas. That is a big ask. I think it is a big ask.

GREG NORMAN: I have done it enough to know what takes place; yet if you are only doing it one time, you might just bite the bullet and say: I am going to go down there; get in Monday, Monday night - I think there is a flight that gets late in the afternoons now - but I am not too sure you get in Monday night one practice round, boom, you go, and that -- it can be extremely hot down there that time and coming out of the cool United States, no matter where you live, got to land down there -- we played in 124 degrees there just recently, so when you are coming out of something cold to really hot, you are going to get -- I am just laying the cards on the table and let these guys know exactly what they are getting into.

GREG NORMAN: From the East Coast it will take you 25, 24 hours elapsed time is about that.

GREG NORMAN: That is commercial. They have got a good flight now Quantas out of New York, L.A., Sydney, so you only got one stop out of New York to Sydney; then you got to get down to Melbourne. I think the earliest you can get into Melbourne would be about 10 or 11 o'clock, mid-morning or whatever morning you arrive. You know, Lee, you went down there for Presidents Cup. If you want to arrive Tuesday, you land -- you got to get to the golf course at 12; tee it up on Wednesday, so anyway -- they will probably -- they will get a good field. Got enough money down there so guys will go.

GREG NORMAN: (laughs).

GREG NORMAN: Thank you.

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