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BOOZ ALLEN CLASSIC

June 22, 2006

Steve Flesch

POTOMAC, MARYLAND

TODD BUDNICK: We welcome Steve Flesch after a 6 under 65. Steve, no bogeys for you today. You hit four birdies and an eagle, a nice day, talk about what went well for you today.

STEVE FLESCH: Kept the ball in play. I mean, drove the ball in the fairway mostly and hit my irons really well. I ran in a few putts but had a lot of good opportunities out there.

TODD BUDNICK: Talk about your year so far.

STEVE FLESCH: Frustrating, but a lot of that has been not necessarily swing related stuff but a little bit of equipment stuff here and there that I've been trying to sort out. You know, I've gone back to some of the stuff I played two years ago, so we'll see if it kind of turns around.

Q. Work on your own clubs, right?

STEVE FLESCH: A little. I don't put people together but I loft one of them myself and I'll grind on the edges a little bit. Being left handed, sometimes, not to say that right handers can't do them, but most of the guys that feel my clubs are right hand, so they look down and see one thing and when I look down I see something totally different.

So I like to do it myself. With me, 90 percent of it is if it looks good. If it doesn't look good, I can't even begin to see if it works, so I've got to get it looking good first and hopefully it will perform.

Q. Have you gone down to your basement shop for working on that?

STEVE FLESCH: Well, I had a good shop in our last home, but we moved four years ago and I purposely didn't put all that stuff in the new home because it just my wife would kill me if I spent all my time down there in the basement with a grinding wheel and a buff pad. I still have the wall machine, but for my own sanity, I didn't put that in. Cleveland Golf has a great trailer out here and if I don't get it sorted out by Wednesday, I'll find a local Nevada Bob's or Dicks if it's an emergency. I think it's all just busy work for me, anyway.

Q. Can you elaborate a little bit, you've had a couple of tournaments where you went low the first two days and then went the other direction on the weekend.

STEVE FLESCH: Memorial, does that come to mind?

Q. You have had a couple

STEVE FLESCH: Subtle way of asking that. You're right, four, obviously stringing four rounds together is one thing but going off the handle there like I did on Saturday is another. At Memorial, I tell you, I did not drive it well at all on Saturday when I shot 85. But that place is so penalizing, and the combination of the rough and the way they had the bunkers furrowed, you just couldn't recover. Granted, I probably wasted, you know, a few in there out of frustration, but, you know, if I would have kept it all together, it still would have been an 80. But that's just how that place is. It's very penalizing. It was tough to get it up and down around there.

The biggest struggle for me has been my irons and getting my irons and my golf ball to do what I'm used to having them do. And you know, it's kind of been a year of working on it and struggling, and this year I kind of brought something old out just to see, for my own peace of mind, if it's me, or, you know, it has been a little bit the equipment. I just brought out my old Cleveland irons that I've been using and I've been using the golf ball that I used a year ago.

You know, not to make a big issue of it, but sometimes in this game, you get to trying so many things that you kind of lose track of home base. You've got to get so far out, trying stuff, that you know, you get sideways and you try so many things, you don't know if it's you or the equipment is different or what. I've gone back to kind of a staple think use for three years, before trying new stuff in the past year. You know, hey, just trying to get my own piece of mind there.

Q. In the first round, do you take notice of a guy like Curtis who is making birdie, birdie, birdie, did you see that, and what goes through if you did, what goes through your mind?

STEVE FLESCH: I don't particularly look at the boards a lot. But last time I saw Ben, he was at 6 under, and I didn't know, you know, finishing the ninth hole there, what he had finished. But first round, even the second round, I don't pay too much attention. The way I've been playing lately, just trying to keep my own game intact.

You can do it, though. The greens are receptive and with this heat, they are going to have to keep them soft enough so the greens don't get away from them. So if you're driving the ball in the fairway, you can be aggressive. You've just got to be below the hole because the greens are fast and they have run out speed. If it gets going by the whole with a little bit of speed, it will run on three or four, five feet by.

Q. Just to follow up, Ben has struggled the last couple years after winning the British Open, something you've seen yourself; have you played with him at all?

STEVE FLESCH: I think actually played with Ben this tournament last year. It was Ben, Phil and I over at Congressional. And Ben and I, yeah, I've seen that he's been struggling as well.

I don't want to say the game has changed anymore, but, you know, when guys struggle, it's not that they are that far off sometimes. It's just, you know, it's a bad drive here and there, a few missed putts here and there. The difference between 70 and 72 out here is huge. Sometimes you can't put your finger on it.

You know, I sympathize with Ben. I've been going through a lot of the same things and it's not that you've lost your game or anything like that. But it's a fine line on Tour, and the Tour really magnifies who is playing well and who isn't. It's easy to notice. That Money List, it's easy to notice where you are and what you need to do.

Q. But no one looks at you and said, hey, you won the British Open and we're expecting you.

STEVE FLESCH: Yeah, I understand. But sometimes when you win a major like that at such a young age, and like a rookie on Tour, that's a lot to live up to. I think Shaun Micheel has kind of gone through the same thing winning the PGA. All of a sudden your name is out there in bright lights. It not like winning a Tour event. It's not like winning a regular event. All of a sudden it's a major and there's a lot that goes with it. .

Guys struggle sometimes I think because they put so much pressure on themselves and their own expectations to become so great that, you know, you've got a lot to live up to being a major championship winner and you're constantly reminded of it. So it's tough.

Q. What particularly did you like about the 6 under today, and what do you think you could have done better, or is there a part you think you could have done better?

STEVE FLESCH: I was just happy with my distance control on my iron shots. You know, that's what I've been it's not that I haven't been hitting the irons on line, off line or anything like that. It's just my distance control has not been very good. So I did that well today and I got the ball close to the hole a couple times because I felt like I had control of it.

You know, what I didn't like, I think I missed three or four birdie putts that, you know, inside ten, 12 feet that I could have. Damn it, I should have been right there at 9 under. (Laughter).

Q. Have you still been doing any Golf Channel work like that famous segment where you took your hat off and went around interviewing people and asked if they knew who you were, including Michelle Wie, who didn't know; have you done any follow up on that?

STEVE FLESCH: You know what the way I've been playing, I'm beginning to think I should do more TV work. I enjoy it. It's more of a scheduling conflict. They have moved that show on the Golf Channel to Friday evening and Thursday night, and I kind of like to go in on Tuesday on Wednesday. One, I'm more laid back on a Tuesday or Wednesday than I am or a Thursday or Friday. And a lot of the stuff that I wanted to start doing was with fellow players and whatnot, once you get once the tournament starts, guys don't cut up as much. You know, I don't want to play practical jokes on my buddies Thursday and Friday. Tuesday is fine on the range, but Thursday is not so good.

I've done one or two segments on it this year, just kind of visiting the set and doing stuff like that. But I haven't been able to show all of my artistic flare since they moved the show.

TODD BUDNICK: Let's go through those birdies, Steve. 17, the first one?

STEVE FLESCH: First one, 17, I hit a 7 iron 184 or something straight downhill about 15 feet behind the hole. Made the putt there.

1, I drove it in the right rough, hit a 9 iron about 12 feet and made that.

3, I hit a good 3 iron, I had I it was 245 or something, pitched it on the front and ran all the way back about seven feet.

6, I hit a good drive and hit a nice, high draw 4 iron around those trees for eagle.

8, hit a good drive and a 9 iron to about 7 feet and made that.

I don't think I played here in five years. I can't remember, but the thing that struck me about the golf course yesterday is how different it played because now the golf balls have just changed. Holes like 6, 7 and 8 used to be 3 , 4 , and 5 irons. I hit a 7 iron on 7 and it's just, it's so different. I'm not saying it's easier but it's really this golf course, a 460 yard hole like the 8th hole used to be a good drive and a 4 iron. I hit a 9 iron and I'm not hitting it seems like much further but the ball is just changing, everything.

Q. Next week they have got the points, FedEx Cup announcement. In theory, they are trying to get the top players together more often. How does it affect rest of you when it's going to come to next year's tournament scheduling?

STEVE FLESCH: I don't honestly think the Tour understands how it's going to work from the players' standpoint because we don't know; they are still figuring out the points and all that. We know, some of the players know some tournaments are moving dates and whatnot, but we are still kind of being informed on how it's going to work.

I think what's going to happen is, you know and this is strictly my opinion but the big players are still going to play the same events. All the events they play already are all the big events. So those events are still going to be the big ones. A few other events are going to move in there.

But, you know, if those big players don't like the golf course or it doesn't fit into kind of where they want to go or their style or schedule, I don't see that changing a whole lot. Maybe one tournament here and there, but those big guys, they are going to play where they want to play. It opens opportunities for us, but you know what, we have 40 events to choose from, anyway. Those guys certainly are not going to go from an 18 event schedule to a 25 event schedule.

Q. So you don't see this as sticking with the rest of you as leftovers or anything like that, outside of the top players?

STEVE FLESCH: No. No, I don't think so. You know, the nice thing about it is everybody's got the same opportunity from the start of the year. So if you get off to a good start and you play well, you're in all the events just like the big guys. That's the way I think every player looks at it. If you play good, I mean, not to oversimplify it, but if you play good, it takes care of itself. Play better. That's the simple way. Work harder, play better; all those opportunities are there the same as they are for Tiger.

Tiger and those guys have earned their way. If you are one of those guys that feel like you're owed something, the only thing you owe it is to yourself to work harder. The opportunity is there.

I don't feel like I don't think guys feel like they are left with the leftovers. I mean, you know, the hardest thing is when most of the events are based on World Rankings. You know I've been on both sides and fortunately for two or three years, I was in all the World events and majors and all that. When they are handing out 8.5 million in a World event and only 50 or 60 guys playing in it, a big opportunity when you're in n that. There's no cut in them. So if you're having an off year but you're in those, it's a lot of money just kind of handed to you. But, you know, you've earned your way in there.

But I think it skews the Money List is what it does. The guys who are in that Top 30, Top 40, I'm not saying they haven't earned their way, but if half those guys are having off years, I mean, they are pretty much you can play really cruddy and still be far enough up the Money List where your card isn't an issue, your World Ranking kind of hangs in there and all that.

So that's where I think some of the players are a little kind of uneasy about the FedEx Cup, how is that really going to shake out.

End of FastScripts.

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