home

jobs

	products recent interviews FastScripts archive about ASAP Sports

Our Clients:

Browse by Sport

Find us on

Subscribe to RSS

Click to go to
Asaptext.com

View our
e-Brochure

CANADIAN OPEN

September 6, 2006

Jim Rutledge

ANCASTER, ONTARIO

TODD BUDNICK: We thank Jim Rutledge for stopping by here for the 2006 Canadian Open. Jim has been playing primarily on the Nationwide Tour the last few years. Your first victory earlier this season, the IMG New Zealand PGA Championship, congratulations on that. I know you have kind of big following from the Canadians. Talk about your first victory on the PGA TOUR event.

JIM RUTLEGE: Well, especially the last round, I was more or less just trying to just get a good tournament under my belt. I had been over there in Australia and missed the cut. I was having a good week. The last round things just fell together. I played a good front 9, had some easy birdie putts and made them.

And then in the back nine I played very well, and had a lot of birdie chances, and then everything came to about all on No. 17. Knocked a sand wedge in from the fairway, and all of a sudden things really, really changed. I just told myself, if you're ever going to make a birdie on a hole in your life, the 18th hole would be a good time to do it right now. Things worked out real good.

TODD BUDNICK: You're ranked 7th on that list right now, with a chance to very good chance of starting your PGA TOUR card for next year. Can you talk about your thoughts on that?

JIM RUTLEGE: I'm trying to keep my foot on the gas. We've got about 7 weeks to go, and there's a lot of guys in the same position. Everybody is fighting to stay inside that top 120 that top 20.

I've been playing good the last few weeks. It's been up and down. I managed to put together a good tournament a couple of weeks ago in Virginia. I'm just having fun with it. It would be great scenario to finish in the top 20.

TODD BUDNICK: Talk about being able to play in the Canadian Open this year, and especially at this course.

JIM RUTLEGE: This is always fun. I love this golf course the first time I played it three years ago. And I just compare it as a hilly version of Shaughnessy, really, which is a great golf course. We played this morning. The course is in great condition. I'm looking forward to it.

Q. Any thought of staying on the Nationwide and keeping your foot on the gas this week and just maybe give us your thought process of why you're taking a break and you're here?

JIM RUTLEGE: I haven't been hot a few weeks ago, because I got to the 200 mark there and I really was having trouble getting over that hump, you know. But I got, nicely enough through Bill Paul, I got the exemption, so I figured I'd just stick to my guns and if I can get a good week under my belt, soon, I'll validate my reasons for coming here. And I always want to play here in I get an invite. Some other fellows are under a different scenario, Chris played well the last couple of weeks, I can understand him going to Utah. He's playing very good now and he could win a tournament very quickly.

I enjoy being here, and I have no regrets at all.

Q. I hate to date you and me, but I saw you play in 1987 at the Canadian PGA Championship. And I don't think I'd ever seen too many players with that much promise. What happened in 20 years? It seemed that you were going to be the next great player to come out of Canada and now 20 years later you're back?

JIM RUTLEGE: Nothing's happened, really, I just maybe my priorities were in a little different line than they should have been. I was enjoying having lots of fun and playing a good Tour in Asia. I was playing in Canada and I was enjoying it. I was having success. So going to the Tour school more or less became a habit at the end of the year. And I don't think I ranked it high enough on my list, because I knew if it didn't work out I was very, very content going back to where I was. And ultimately playing in Asia all the time we were trying to get into Japan, and that was the way to do it, through the Order of Merit.

Q. You mentioned Hamilton as one of your favorite courses to play the Canadian Open, and obviously Shaughnessy, is as well. Could you talk about Shaughnessy, what you like about that. Are there any other courses in Canada, outside of those two, that might serve, in your mind as a great Canadian Open?

JIM RUTLEGE: Probably the National Golf Club, would probably be the top of my list in Canada. I've always liked that golf course. They played the LeBatt International there, I believe, in '81 or '82, something like, that, and I think Trevino was the only one to shoot under par. That's a great venue, and we'll probably never go there again, but that would be one of my favorites.

This and Shaughnessy are very, very much alike, a hilly version. Shaughnessy is a good old golf course like this one. And everything is right in front of you. There's no tricks. There's no railroad ties. It's just good golf. Good golf. Everybody says the same. You've heard the same comments, I think, from Shaughnessy and from here, when the guys were here three years ago.

Q. What does it mean to you? Presumably you will be on the Tour next year. What significance does it have for you?

JIM RUTLEGE: Right now I'm taking it I'm really, really looking forward to it. But on the other hand I'm looking forward to trying to finish the year off in style. I want to ultimately finish in the Top 5 at the end of the year, because that will get me an earlier start. But to do something like that at this age, it would be a lot of fun, I think, a lot of fun.

Q. (Inaudible.)

JIM RUTLEGE: Well, I think it's just

Q. (Inaudible.)

JIM RUTLEGE: It's just the atmosphere and the fact that I did it. I finally got myself out there, one way or another. And the important most important thing for me and in that position now, was winning earlier in this year. Otherwise you claw away and take small bites. But you have to take big chunks. John Mills will tell you the same thing. Last year he did the same thing. The tournaments he played well, he played really well, and that's what you've got to do.

Q. I'm curious about how a guy turns it around from one season to the next. With you, you got off to a good start, a solid start. Was it just a matter of getting a real good tournament in early, in this case a victory?

JIM RUTLEGE: Yep.

Q. Or has it been other things, mental, physical or anything like that?

JIM RUTLEGE: Mental, mostly, I read that book, Fearless Golf by Gio Valiante, probably September of last year and I just took to it. You have a lot of books in your life to read and get out of it, but I took to that book. It made sense, and I took a different path to playing golf courses and golf tournaments this year. I didn't do anything I haven't done anything different all year long, I've just tried to stick to that routine. And it's been working.

Q. If you can describe, then, if there's one message or something that you can tell us that you got from that book, what would it be? Like what's the basis for it or what's the

JIM RUTLEGE: Well, bottom line, if I'm worrying about Mike Weir and Mike Weir is worrying about me and who's worried about playing the golf course? Nobody is. So if you just play the golf course one shot at a time, and just strictly play the course, don't worry about the leaderboards, don't worry about anybody else, just play the golf course the best of your ability one shot at a time, day to day, and see what happens at the end of the week. It just clicked for me. And it's really, really helped me. It's helped me calm down and just helped me play golf.

Q. You never thought of that before?

JIM RUTLEGE: Well, I thought about it before there are other things there are other things in that book, but that's it's probably the main key, you know what I mean? Sometimes I look around too much. I'm watching too many other things on the golf course than watching myself and taking care of myself. And that's this has helped me do that. There's a lot of practice involved this year, too. I've probably worked a lot harder than I have in the past and it's

Q. Have you decided how many times that you actually attended Q School? I believe it was 13.

JIM RUTLEGE: I don't know if that number is true or not.

Q. You remember that?

JIM RUTLEDGE: I stopped counting.

Q. So you figure about 16, 17?

JIM RUTLEGE: Not that many. But I think they've pretty much hit the nail on the head, pretty close to that.

Q. Back in the late '80s I believe you have made it all the way through the final stage of Q School, and did you hurt your leg?

JIM RUTLEGE: I was on the edge of a cliff near the beach, and I came down and landed on my hand and fractured the bone in the middle of my hand; that put me out for the whole year.

Q. That took you out of the final stage?

JIM RUTLEGE: Which was only probably three weeks later.

Q. You consider that a turning point in your career, not a good turning point?

JIM RUTLEGE: Big screw up, yeah. I was playing good at the time.

Q. What were you doing?

JIM RUTLEGE: We were at Trinidad playing a golf tournament and we were just at the beach, after a round of golf, and had just gone to go down to the beach to lay on the beach and slipped and fell down the cliff, slid down the cliff and landed on my hand. That was it. Just a fluke accident.

Q. You talked about maybe your priorities weren't where they should have been 20 years ago or whatever. Do you ever have any regret about how things worked out and how long it took you to get here or do you

JIM RUTLEGE: No, no, I can't look back and have regrets. I think I have to look forward. As to the time that I have and hopefully have the rest of my career, I just have to stick to my guns and learn to really use what I have learned in the last while and keep going with it.

Q. Has anything changed for you since you pretty much became sure that you were going to make the Tour next year?

JIM RUTLEGE: I hate to say it, I hope I have enough as I sit, but I'm trying to just finish in the Top 5 in the year, have some good finishes and make some money, so I have a good chance at an early start next year.

TODD BUDNICK: The higher you finish the better spot you have for next year?

JIM RUTLEGE: They take the Tour school and take the top 20 and go like that. 20 is 40, basically.

Q. You give your wife a lot of credit for supporting you during your time in Asia and so forth. Sounds like you have a wife a lot different than a lot of wives in this room?

JIM RUTLEGE: She's been a pretty good fighter, herself. She's been through breast cancer and loss of her father who she was very, very close to, he was going through the same things she was at the same time, chemo and radiation. She's the one that has been very, very supportive, along with the rest of the family. Just stay out there, keep hammering away at it and good things will happen.

Q. Is she with you this week?

JIM RUTLEGE: No, she's at home, my boys went back to school today.

Q. What is her name?

JIM RUTLEGE: Ryan, Jillian.

Q. You've been the center of some media scrutiny with some articles in the Globe and Mail and Vancouver Sun recently. Have the likes of David Hern or John Mills given you any advice about dealing with the extra scrutiny of moving to the PGA TOUR?

JIM RUTLEGE: No, but they've given me help on other facets of the game. I've watched their work ethic in the last few years, and I've drawn off that. I enjoyed playing a lot of golf with John last year. And I enjoyed after the round. We could go home easy, and John says let's go chip for a while, let's go putt for a while. And I said, okay, let's do it. Same with David. We hang around and play golf and we practice together, and we try to keep each other out there working hard. That's helped a lot.

Q. You were saying that you've been enjoying your time out there, but I'm sure there must have been some low points. Were you ever close to trying to look at other careers? Did you ever almost quit the game at any point professionally?

JIM RUTLEGE: Probably about three years ago, when my wife had difficulties there and her father passed and my father passed and my grandfather passed away all within about a year, year and a half. Golf was not a priority at all, really. But we've turned the page and things are good at home now. I'm enjoying playing golf.

Q. To keep up with the young guys, do you work out, do you have to do any extra stretching, do you have to work hard?

JIM RUTLEGE: Not really, just hitting lots of balls and practicing. I don't really think about it, to tell you the truth. More people bring it up than I think about it, that's for sure. Workout hasn't been a big thing on my list. I just play a lot of golf. I watch what I eat and I try to take care of myself.

TODD BUDNICK: Thank you very much. Good luck.

End of FastScripts.

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297