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LONGS DRUGS CHALLENGE

October 2, 2007

Natalie Gulbis

DANVILLE, CALIFORNIA

ASHLEY CUSHMAN: Natalie, thanks for coming in and joining us today. You've had a remarkable 2007 season so far, including your first win on tour.
NATALIE GULBIS: Thank you.
ASHLEY CUSHMAN: Just talk about the year in general, what a success it's been for you.
NATALIE GULBIS: This has definitely been my best year on tour, winning my first event and also being part of the victorious Solheim Cup team, winning over in Europe.
What a perfect place to be this week. I played in this event 10 years ago at 14, so it's fun to be back here 10 years later.
ASHLEY CUSHMAN: Also Solheim Cup, the winning U.S. team, all that, you've had a little bit of a break since then. Do you want to talk about maybe recharging your batteries, coming back here to a familiar place, what that means.
NATALIE GULBIS: Definitely this is an event I really want to play well in. So I wanted to take last week to work on my game and get ready for this next stretch of events.
ASHLEY CUSHMAN: We'll open it up to questions for Natalie.

Q. A question I like to ask you and a lot of the players out here, you've played a ton of golf obviously in northern California. How different is this golf course? How different a venue than the courses you see on the rest of the tour the rest of the year for you?
NATALIE GULBIS: Well, it's quite a bit different. Different sort of grasses. You have bentgrass greens. The way that they roll, the way they perform on the greens is different. This is the sort of style golf that I grew up playing. So it's a little bit easier for me to play on these sort of golf courses because I played a lot of them in the Bay Area.

Q. Maybe not as tough from a course management standpoint for you on this golf course than, say, the Solheim Cup was.
NATALIE GULBIS: Solheim Cup golf course that we played over there is definitely one of the more challenging golf courses I've ever played. So I think most courses that we play would seem a little bit easier.

Q. Talk about last year. You were looking forward to playing, had to pull out at the last minute. How disappointing was that, and how eager are you to play in northern California? What happened last year?
NATALIE GULBIS: Extremely disappointing. I actually got a Staph infection. Showed up in my finger. Went and did a whole bunch of other stuff. That was last year.
This event has always been kind of near and dear to my heart because I did play in it. This is my first LPGA event. Brian Flajole give me a sponsor exemption into this event and I qualified for it.
I love playing close to home. This is the closest event that gets to my hometown, Sacramento. So I have a lot of friends and family that will hopefully be out to cheer for me this week. It will be great catching up with them, too.

Q. You didn't play last week. I guess it cost you the upcoming Samsung. Do you pick your schedule that far in advance? Is that something you could have adjusted?
NATALIE GULBIS: I do pick my schedule, usually do my schedule in January. This ends the regular season LPGA event. I was planning on playing in Samsung. That's why I took off -- another reason I took off the event in Alabama because I knew I was playing in Samsung and I wanted to get ready for the stretch of three events.
But the schedule changes all the time. New events get added in and also new opportunities, like I just got invited to play in the Wendy's 3-Tour Challenge. Those are great additions to the schedule.

Q. (No microphone.)
NATALIE GULBIS: Solheim No. 1, by far. Both Solheims that I've actually played in have been the most amazing weeks of my career out here. Having the opportunity to play in some of those events as a team and represent your country, represent the LPGA, those players, kind of coming together is a pretty unbelievable experience.
The second would be definitely my own personal win in Evian. That was a big accomplishment for me in my own career.
Playing St. Andrews was more kind of a groundbreaking experience for women's golf, to go over there and play on a golf course where golf started. It was an amazing week. You could really get the feel amongst the players at how excited everybody was to not only play St. Andrews but to be part of the first professional women's event there at the old course.

Q. (No microphone.)
NATALIE GULBIS: I am. Seen him all last week.

Q. (No microphone.)
NATALIE GULBIS: Butch and I have always had a deal with golf balls. When I first came out and started working with him five or six years ago, I would hit range balls. I'd asked him one day how come I had to hit range balls, and when Adam, Scott and Tiger came out, they got to use regular, nice, pretty Titleist balls. He said it was because I hadn't won a tournament.
A couple years went on and I continued to use the range balls. After I had a good season, I finished sixth on the Money List, played in the Solheim Cup, he told me I could use the news golf balls.
I said, No, you were pretty clear about these bad golf balls. So when I called him, that's the first thing I said, is, You better get my nice golf balls ready.
The second thing was probably thanking him for all his help. He always puts the winning flags of the players that have won up in his room, in his office. The Evian Masters flag is like a bright, hot pink flag. It couldn't be any brighter. I finally got to sign that one for him.

Q. What does the win do in terms of your psyche? Is there less pressure? Are you able to have more fun when you're out on the course?
NATALIE GULBIS: I've always had a lot of fun on the golf course. I don't think that changes much. But the win was a personal goal. I've always dreamed of winning on the LPGA Tour since I played in my professional event. So that was a big accomplishment.
It was fun to give that back to the fans and to the sponsors and to my friends and family that have supported and believed in me so long, that it actually could happen.

Q. It was mentioned during the Solheim Cup that Paula really emerged as one of the team leaders. Can you talk about her maturity over the years since she's been on tour, and did that come through over in Sweden?
NATALIE GULBIS: Paula is a great player. She's been a great player out on tour since she came out. I've been privileged to play in a lot of team events with her, not only Solheim Cup but some World Cup events.
She not only is a great individual player, but she's a great team player. I think that really showed on and off the golf course in this year's Solheim Cup. She played in five matches. I think she played three full practice rounds. She's one of those players that she wants it really bad and it always shows in her performances.

Q. Paula was in here earlier talking about demands off the course, how this last off-season she forced herself to take a break. You obviously have a lot of business pursuits off the course. How difficult has that been to balance? Do you ever talk about that when you're together at the Solheim? Do you discuss the challenges of playing out here and also building sort of a brand?
NATALIE GULBIS: Well, it's been a lot of fun. I've been very fortunate over these last four or five years to be involved in some activities outside of the golf course, like the show, the website. We're starting to be able to do more work with the foundation, stuff that I never would have dreamed I'd be able to have the opportunity to be involved in.
As far as just scheduling it, I learned real quick about how important it was to manage your time and manage your schedule. When I look at my schedule, I mean, the golf comes first, my practice comes first, and my downtime, my workouts come first. If I have time to do other things, I love doing those, too.

Q. How much practice have you gotten in on this course? What have you seen that makes you think you have a chance of winning here this week?
NATALIE GULBIS: Well, I got to play. I played 18 holes on the golf course yesterday, then I went out and played it again today. I think this golf course, I don't remember what the scores were last year, but I think with the conditions being in such good shape, the projected weather is supposed to be good, I think you're going to have to make a lot of birdies out here. Iron play is very important because the green is small, you're going to want to be in the correct spots.
It's a fun golf course. It's in beautiful shape. It's just a really, really nice golf course. Lot of different shots you get the opportunity to hit. I'm looking forward to playing on it.

Q. Can you talk a little bit about Lorena's year so far. Obviously three straight wins, almost four straight. Seemed like once she got that major out of the way, things really started to break for her. Talk about her season so far.
NATALIE GULBIS: Lorena has had an absolutely incredible season. She's had an incredible career, too. I played in college with Lorena. She's been very successful at almost every single level that she's played. She's had one incredible year. I've seen Annika have some great years, and Lorena has definitely had an unbelievable year.
After she won that major, she just continued to keep going. I think she just won big event after big event. She's one of those players now that if she's in the field, you know she's going to be one of the players at the top at the end.

Q. (No microphone.)
NATALIE GULBIS: We played against each other all the time. You mean in tournaments?

Q. (No microphone.)
NATALIE GULBIS: We had kind of a cool stat. We played eight events. She won three events, and I won three events. We both didn't win one event. One event I beat her actually in a playoff. But there were so many events where she would win, I finished second. If I'd win, she finished second. We had a nice little rivalry between us.

Q. You talked about the win, fulfilling a dream. How did that change? Did it change interaction from fans at all? Did it give you more confidence? What's the next step?
NATALIE GULBIS: What it did is it answered some questions. I think when you're out here, you continue to overanalyze and overanalyze your routine, if what you're doing is correct, if you're playing the right equipment, if everything you're doing is right on. And I think when you have success out here, it solidifies that what you're doing is good for you.
My routine really has not changed much in the last couple years, and I've had a lot of good finishes with that routine. It was nice to see that the same practice schedule and the same things I was working on my swing paid off.

Q. Talk about the fan interaction, maybe the perception of you being changed.
NATALIE GULBIS: The only thing that I've noticed is it's been fun this week where I remember last year when I came back, it was nice to see you, nice to have you home. I've gotten a lot of congratulatory remarks from fans, which has been fun as well.

Q. With all the ancillary things you do, you've really exceeded your dreams. Do you still have showbiz aspirations? What new dreams are coming?
NATALIE GULBIS: More work with my foundation. I have got to do more stuff with that and get that thing going, get more publicity to that, to being able to use some of these outside vehicles to kind of build up my brand, to be able to use them for some charity work and some ways to give back.
ASHLEY CUSHMAN: Thanks for your time, Natalie. Good luck this week.
NATALIE GULBIS: Thank you.

End of FastScripts

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