WENDY'S CHAMPIONSHIP FOR CHILDREN

August 23, 2006

Cristie Kerr

PAUL ROVNAK: Cristie, thanks for coming in. You're the defending champion this week. You've also won twice this year. And I think your last two tournaments you've got the victory and a tie for second, I believe. You've played some great golf coming in to a place you've already won. Talk about coming back.

CRISTIE KERR: It's great to come back. I love the golf course and the area. And Wendy's has always been very good to me, supporting my charity, Birdies for Breast Cancer, and just putting on a world class event. It always draws a great field and I'm just glad to be back.

PAUL ROVNAK: We'll go ahead and take questions for Cristie.

Q. What are some of the responsibilities not responsibilities, but the fact that you are defending champion, does that kind of get your attention a little bit more, simply because you know people are going to be focusing on you this week as the defender?

CRISTIE KERR: Absolutely, especially defend here. I just have great memories coming back. I've not defended a tournament yet, so I would really like to do that and accomplish that. I've been playing some great golf as of late. I've had a lot of good things going on in my golf game and in my swing, my short game, my putting. I've been playing with a lot of confidence. And when it's like that for me, it's a lot of fun to play golf.

Q. Last month you said it just wasn't totally clicking. What's happened in the last month? You said you were close, I think.

CRISTIE KERR: Yes, I felt like I was close. And it's nice sitting here a month later knowing that's happened. It was just me finding the place that I go to to be able to focus and just you know, focus really, really specifically on what I'm trying to do. It's hard to explain to people that I found that zone again, that I found the place I go to where I play well.

Sometimes you just have got to let yourself fall into it. I felt like I was working really hard and it wasn't quite happening for me a month ago. And lo and behold, I had a great three weeks. I played great today, so I'm looking forward to the week.

Q. Each shot swing helps that, too, mentally, I'm sure, to come back.

CRISTIE KERR: Absolutely. I had a great round going. I could have shot 10 or 11 under, but I was happy to see that I was close. Eight shots is a lot to come back from. I knew I was going to have to shoot low to have a chance to win on Sunday in Canada. Sometimes when you put the pressure on, then you do shoot a low round and you get in the house. It's hard to finish and close and win a golf tournament. You just never know what's going to happen and you can just put yourself in position to try to win every week. That's all you can do. If you play well and the putts go your way, eventually you do win.

Q. Do you have a killer instinct type of mentality? To be able to come back from something like that just doesn't happen, you have to be sort of in attack mode.

CRISTIE KERR: Absolutely. I've always had that thing inside me where I've had that great determination. And, you know, if I feel I can accomplish something I go after it and I do it. I'm very blessed to have the talent to back that up. I definitely have the killer instinct. I love winning. It's a very addicting feeling. And I'm in a very good place in my career right now.

Q. Any connection is that part of the reason that Donald Trump and you are buddies, kind of? He doesn't take losing lightly.

CRISTIE KERR: That's kind of an out there question.

Q. It is.

CRISTIE KERR: Donald and I are good friends and he's a lot of fun to play golf with. He has got that in business. I feel like I have it in golf. Maybe that's why we're friends. I just think he's a stand up, terrific guy. He has done a lot for the game of golf.

You were just trying to find something to ask that hadn't been asked before, right?

Q. Winning, is it a learned behavior? You've spoken about that before.

CRISTIE KERR: It's definitely part that. It's definitely fifty percent that. It's knowing you can do it, having the confidence to be able to hit the shots under pressure when you need to. You still have to do it. So it's a learned behavior, but you still have to do it.

Q. Webb and Creamer both have come in here today and said the course is awfully wet, particularly in the fairways. Talk about the course conditions.

CRISTIE KERR: Yes, it's soft. I don't know why. Maybe a lot of rain or they're watering it a lot.

Q. No rain.

CRISTIE KERR: I would have to say they're expecting a lot of heat on the weekend and maybe they're trying to keep the course a little bit soft right now because they're expecting the heat and they're not going to water it quite as much. I'm sure it will be playing the way they want it to be playing come the weekend.

There are a lot of divots in the fairways, so you've got to expect that your ball will land in a divot. You just have to manage your shot out of there. I think the greens are rolling very well. There are a lot of ball marks on the greens, though, but it's not like you can fix a ball mark so it's not really going to affect your putt. The greens are rolling at a good speed. I think the course is in good condition otherwise.

PAUL ROVNAK: Thanks, Cristie.

End of FastScripts.