|
|||
|
|||
|
 |
|
|
U.S. WOMEN'S OPEN CHAMPIONSHIPJuly 2, 1998Alison NicholasKOHLER, WISCONSIN RHONDA GLENN: Ladies and gentlemen, Alison Nicholas has had a bit of a struggle today, but very gracious to visit with us today. Tell us your general impressions. ALISON NICHOLAS: Can you print that? (making frustrating sound). RHONDA GLENN: Spell it. ALISON NICHOLAS: I don't know. Started off all right. I mean, I haven't been playing very well recently anyway. I have been -- I suppose I just got a bit tight. RHONDA GLENN: Tired out there? ALISON NICHOLAS: No, tight. Q. Tense, you mean? ALISON NICHOLAS: Whatever word you want to use, you are the journalists. You know. RHONDA GLENN: Did you feel that way before you teed off this morning or as the round progressed? ALISON NICHOLAS: No, no. As the round progressed. RHONDA GLENN: Can you tell us a little bit about bogeys? ALISON NICHOLAS: That many I can't -- how many bogeys did I have? Q. Could you run through the card, birdies, bogeys, whatever, please? RHONDA GLENN: She doesn't have her card with her. ALISON NICHOLAS: Par on the 1st. Par on the 2nd. Q. Regulation? ALISON NICHOLAS: Yeah. Q. Hit the fairway both times? ALISON NICHOLAS: I did. No. 3 -- RHONDA GLENN: Let us have these people ask the questions first; then we can get her a score card which we will distribute to all of you. If you want to talk to her about the individual scores, we can do that afterwards. Q. That seems a bit drawn. ALISON NICHOLAS: Don't worry. Q. What specifically about your game, aside from the illness, what has been the struggle in your game? ALISON NICHOLAS: The driver. RHONDA GLENN: How about today? ALISON NICHOLAS: Oh, yeah. Hit a few good ones, but then as I got further through the round, I struggled, was hitting it left. Then hit one right. Just the same as last week, really. This is a tougher golf course than last week. I got myself into some long grass that was taller than I was. Luckily for the spectators, stepped around it, so I could actually see my ball. Q. Where was this? ALISON NICHOLAS: On No. 10. That was way right. Q. How did you get out of it? ALISON NICHOLAS: With a sand wedge, a big thrash, it was. Q. Did you have to punch out into the fairway? ALISON NICHOLAS: Well, yeah to go left. Yeah. I closed my eyes at that point. Q. No. 5. ALISON NICHOLAS: Oh, yes, went in the water on No. 5. Q. Which side? ALISON NICHOLAS: Left. Q. What about? ALISON NICHOLAS: 7-wood. Q. How far had you in? ALISON NICHOLAS: About a couple of feet, well, no, two yards. Q. When you were standing with your 7-wood in your hand, how far was it from there to the middle of the green? ALISON NICHOLAS: I can't remember to be honest with you. Q. How far did you hit your 7 wood? ALISON NICHOLAS: Let's see. Okay, it was about 165, 170, something like that. Just take a guess at that. Q. So it is a hard hole? ALISON NICHOLAS: It is a tough hole, yeah. That is what I have been doing, I either hit it left or right. Then you don't want to hit left or right on that hole basically. You want to hit it straight. RHONDA GLENN: Annika triple bogeyed on that hole, you did beat her on that hole. ALISON NICHOLAS: I did. I got 6. RHONDA GLENN: What are you going to try to do tomorrow? ALISON NICHOLAS: Play golf again. Just go out and -- I think I am going to try and think of nothing tomorrow, just whack it at the stick. Like a therapist over here. Q. I was just going to ask you a psychotherapy question, but I won't. ALISON NICHOLAS: Thank God for that. RHONDA GLENN: Defending champions historically have had a lot of trouble coming back. You saw what happened to Annika last year going for three in a row. There is a great burden on you. Did you feel that coming this week? ALISON NICHOLAS: I didn't to start with. I think when I was signing a lot of autographs and the fans have been brilliant and they kept sort of going on about, sort of: "Repeat, repeat." That is all I have heard for the last two days. So probably, you know, I felt a bit more pressure today than I did, say, Tuesday. RHONDA GLENN: More than you normally do in any other golf tournament? ALISON NICHOLAS: Yeah, because I mean, the attention is on you and, well, yeah, obviously, I have never defended -- I defended the British Open, but I never defended obviously the U.S. Open before. So you never know how you are going to react. But I haven't been playing well and that was on my mind and kind of tough. Q. Did you fair well on the greens today, Alison? ALISON NICHOLAS: Yeah, not too bad. I mean, they are very tricky to read. You do really need to hit it in the right place. I think I probably missed about two, three that I thought I should have made. But I misread one. Q. What sort of length? ALISON NICHOLAS: Seven feet. Six or seven feet. Where, you know, maybe I have missed a green and chipped up reasonably and just, you know, felt good over them, but I misread one and then hit another one too hard. They are -- you have to be very precise with the speed as well as the break. It is just my driving that pulled me out. I missed those two second shots on the fifth -- the 6th. I did the same thing on the 18th. Q. Was it in the water there? ALISON NICHOLAS: Yeah, well, it was sort of half in, half out. I was tempted to have a go because the crowd would go, "Go on, go on," I thought that I could be here all day. RHONDA GLENN: It was sort of half-in, half-out of the water? ALISON NICHOLAS: Yeah, on the left, near the hospitality booths, on the left. RHONDA GLENN: Did you only hit the water twice today? ALISON NICHOLAS: Yeah. But I took double both times. Q. Can you talk about the differences and the similarities of your experience at the Open last year and here? ALISON NICHOLAS: Well, I obviously didn't have an interview or anything - who is Alison Nicholas? I went out and played with two qualifiers and we, you know, no limelight whatsoever until obviously I came in with a 66, didn't I, on the second day, I think. RHONDA GLENN: I believe so. I don't have the record with me. ALISON NICHOLAS: I think so, you know, -- I am sure Annika felt the same. I spoke to Lotta's caddie. He said that she found it extremely difficult because of the attention and she said -- I suppose it is perhaps of letting go, what people say. I don't know, you just want to perform well and the limelight is on you. I hadn't been playing well, as someone said to me, really, this isn't the place to come and find your game. Q. Who said that to you? ALISON NICHOLAS: That is afterwards, which is fine. Q. Who was it? ALISON NICHOLAS: It doesn't matter who it was. Q. You don't want to tell me then? ALISON NICHOLAS: No. Q. Alison, is one of the battles that you have to get over this week is the fact that you won last year, it is a tremendous year; lots of great things happen to you and now with the start of the following year's tournament, it could represent the end of being the champion and is that an emotional battle that you have to wage with yourself? ALISON NICHOLAS: Well, I mean, not really. I mean, you can only be a champion for a year unless you obviously win it again, which I don't think there is anybody but six players; is that right? RHONDA GLENN: I believe so. ALISON NICHOLAS: So, I mean, out of -- what is this the -- RHONDA GLENN: I believe it's the 53rd. ALISON NICHOLAS: 53 people and only six have repeated, so, the odds are against you. I mean, you want to play well. I mean, you do because you want to -- Q. It is like tough to know that it is coming to an end? ALISON NICHOLAS: No, because no one could never take it away from me. My name is on the trophy. Simple as that. Q. Forever, that is for sure. ALISON NICHOLAS: Yeah. RHONDA GLENN: Thank you very much. End of FastScripts.... |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
About ASAP Sports •
FastScripts Archive •
Recent Interviews •
Captioning •
Upcoming Events •
Contact Us
FastScripts | Events Covered | Our Clients | Other Services | ASAP in the News | Site Map | Job Opportunities | Links |
|
ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297
|