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BUICK OPEN

August 3, 2006

Woody Austin

GRAND BLANC, MICHIGAN

DAVE SENKO: Woody, maybe just give us kind of a quick rundown of your day, 65.

WOODY AUSTIN: Started out on 1, hit an awesome chip shot from just short of the green to about three feet, made birdie.

Played solid all day. Hit a lot of good shots. Hit it about six feet, six, seven feet on 4, made that one.

DAVE SENKO: What did you hit?

WOODY AUSTIN: I hit driver, 9 iron.

Then 5 was the big hit of the day. I hit a bad drive down the left side and hit a low hook out there up on to the green and made it from 80 feet. Longest putt I've ever made, by far. It was pretty sweet.

Turned around on 6 and hit 9 iron to about three feet.

Then I got to No. 8 and I hit the flagstick on the fly, but it kept still went by about probably 15, 20 feet. Probably 15, so I made that.

Hit a good shot into ten about six feet and didn't make that one.

Hit it about four or five feet on 12, made that one.

Hit it about five feet on 14 and didn't make that one.

I had my first good up and down on 15. I left it short of the green and chipped it up to about four feet and made that.

Then 16, I hit it to about three feet.

Missed about a 12 footer on 17. Solid round of golf.

DAVE SENKO: How were the conditions?

WOODY AUSTIN: You know, considering, I mean, the golf course is holding up quite well.

It seems, you know, this is my 12th year playing the tournament, and it seems that no matter what condition or what weather has come through previous to our tournament or during our tournament, the golf course is always in great shape. The greens are always some of the best we play every year, bar none. And I think that's why the scores every year are always so good. The golf course is always in such good shape. So it held up just fine.

Then when we get to lift, clean and cheat, that makes it a lot easier.

Q. Talk about that 80 foot putt.

WOODY AUSTIN: I can't recall ever making one even remotely obviously I've been playing this game long enough to know I've made a 50 footer and what have you, maybe a little longer, but I ain't never made something that long. Because when you think about it, there's only a few chances you'd probably even have in a year of that length to begin with.

It was just, you know, trying to get it close. And the funny thing about it was it was about five, ten feet short and I'm just looking at it. And my caddie all of a sudden, eagle holding the flag and he goes, "You made it." Sure enough, it went right in the middle like nothing.

Q. I know you finished pretty well at Milwaukee last week. Did you feel something?

WOODY AUSTIN: No question. I putted great on the weekend and it just gave me some confidence. Because you know going into this tournament you're going to have to go low. Like I said it doesn't matter what conditions, the golf course is always in great shape to where the guys all go low. So it was important to know that I was putting well because if you go out there and you play well and you don't get it going here, it's pretty frustrating. Because you stand there and you look at the leaderboard today, it's just birdie, birdie, birdie, birdie, birdie.

So if you feel like you're leaving too many shots out there, then you feel like you're way behind.

Q. This is one of the venues you've won at. What kind of a feeling do you have coming back here and does it give you extra confidence when you play?

WOODY AUSTIN: Obviously since it was the first, you never forget your first, unless you're somebody like Tiger that's won a hundred, then you might have forgot your first. But it's a lot of fun coming back to it. I've had a couple bad years here, but predominately I've always played good here. The course always treated me nice.

I love tree lined golf courses. I love the course that shows me what it wants as far as its shape. I'm not a lover of modern day golf, so I love to come back to the older venues.

Q. I can't remember how long you won here, maybe ten years or so ago, did you feel at that point in your career you'd probably have, you know, several more wins?

WOODY AUSTIN: Well, I got started late. I got sidetracked and got started late. When I finally got out here and got my feet wet, I felt like I was going to prove that I belonged out here.

Unfortunately not everybody's life as far as their careers just kind of go in sync. There's a few where everything just goes their way and there's those of us who kind of get sidetracked or something happened. Unfortunately for me I've been sidetracked more than once. (Laughing).

The nice thing about it, my upbringing, I'm pretty stubborn and I've fought my way back and I will continue to keep fighting, and hopefully I'll eventually reach the potential I knew I had, maybe the potential of the 45 year old, as opposed to a 30 year old, but I know that I have yet to show what I'm really capable of.

Q. Is this a reunion with an old friend and can you tell us any stories about Mike Mattucci from high school?

WOODY AUSTIN: There's quite a few with Mikey. I used to call he reminds me a lot, I can say he reminds me a lot of my caddie. My caddie is a former professional, and as he puts it, he may take a long time to get to the green, but once he gets there, he knows what he's doing. That's what Mike was. You may never know how he was going to get to the green, but when he got there, you knew what he was going to do. Mike was a really good player from around the greens and on the greens. He just struggled a little bit with the ball striking aspect of it.

But a super nice guy and a really good tournament host he's been the last few years. I'm just a couple years ahead of him. He was there for my last two maybe or my last one.

End of FastScripts.

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