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VALERO TEXAS OPEN

October 6, 2007

Jesper Parnevik

SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS

NELSON SILVERIO: Jesper, thanks for spending a couple minutes with us again.
Tournament leader going into Sunday. Give us some thoughts on your round today and maybe your plan for tomorrow.
JESPER PARNEVIK: I mean it was a little bit tougher than I expected out there. The wind was blowing a lot more but I was thinking I was a little bit more uptight, even though I got off to a great start, hit a wedge to about four feet on 1 and holed the putt, but I missed a short one on the 2nd hole which tightened up my putting stroke quite a bit and felt pretty average over the putts after that, I have to say.
But I mean I hung in there. I did a terrible bogey on 10. I thought I hit a good driver, had a wedge in there, made bogey. I figured it ticked me off a little bit because I birdied the next three. That was a good thing.
For not having a great day, I'm very happy to shoot 4-under par.

Q. Got that big 16 footer on No. 13. How big a putt was that when --
JESPER PARNEVIK: What?

Q. You hit like a 60-foot birdie, third straight birdie?
JESPER PARNEVIK: Probably more like 15 feet, 16 feet.

Q. You're saying ShotLink is lying?
JESPER PARNEVIK: Must have been lying very much because 60 feet -- what does it say?
NELSON SILVERIO: 16 feet.
JESPER PARNEVIK: 16 feet, yeah. I thought you said 60 feet. Okay.

Q. You're speaking too much Swedish. Three straight birdies there. You needed that right there. You had a lot of guys knocking on the door.
JESPER PARNEVIK: I always need three birdies in a row, trust me. I'll take it anytime.
Yeah. I mean it was a good time to do it because everything was kind of hanging there, didn't know which way to turn because Mathias was playing great, Justin Leonard was playing great. Lot of guys were playing good golf in front of me.
I knew that coming in today I could not go out and shoot even par round and still -- I knew I had a comfortable lead out there. It's not going to be the same thing tomorrow.
I should not be lying. It was tough out there, I thought, for me. I was not very relaxed over the shots or the putts and the way I remember, it was a lot easier to win tournaments than it was out there today.
I mean I think the reason why is when I won all those tournaments I was winning one or two tournaments every year and I was up there pretty much every week which -- and because of that, of course, I'm playing well so I expected to win pretty much every week.
Now when I haven't played that great for awhile it's a lot tougher because those bad shots seem to stick back in your mind some.

Q. Tomorrow is obviously very important to you.
JESPER PARNEVIK: I mean it's going to be tough day, no doubt about it.
Even though I feel like I'm playing fairly well, the putter feels so-so but I mean it would have been easier if it was a really tough course and I could go out and chip or putt around and shoot 1-over, somebody would have to catch me.
Tomorrow I need to shoot maybe mid-60s again to keep my lead which is a little bit tougher to know when you're standing on the first tee that you got to shoot mid-60s to hang on pretty much.

Q. Other than 10, it looked like your iron play today was as good as it's been all week, maybe better?
JESPER PARNEVIK: I still hit a lot -- I hit five, six shots, very, very close, probably within four, five feet, and so that's been a big thing this week.
Even the first round I hit three, four shots within four feet and 2-putted once from six feet for a birdie. That was pretty much it.
I have been driving it well the first few rounds which gave me -- today I hit a little bit more in the rough which made the approach shots a lot tougher all of a sudden and, like I said, it's not as easy when you have 20, 30 footers on a few of the holes out there.

Q. What do you think happened on 10? You were almost in the perfect spot.
JESPER PARNEVIK: Everyday I've been short of that hole and today we actually said make sure you get it past the hole then, of course, in the downwind I wanted to hit it stiff. I eased up a bit. Came up short again.
I don't know. It plays a lot more uphill than we think it should do there.

Q. Mathias mentioned that he caddie for you in the Swedish Match Play in '85.
JESPER PARNEVIK: Yeah, that's right.

Q. What it's going to be like having your former caddie trying to take a tournament away from you?
JESPER PARNEVIK: I mean he's a former caddie but Mathias is a great player. He played very solid today. I know he hasn't won over here yet. He's won a lot of times in Europe. He knows how to play to win a tournament, no doubt about it.
He caddie for me, I don't think I will think too much about it tomorrow.

Q. Said he's not going to give you any club section.
JESPER PARNEVIK: He better not, no.

Q. You played with Justin much before?
JESPER PARNEVIK: Not that much, actually. I can't remember last time I played with him, actually.

Q. Did y'all play to go at Troon?
JESPER PARNEVIK: No. He was way ahead. He shot like 64, 65 last day there so he was probably four groups ahead of us. He better not do that tomorrow.

Q. He's had a pretty good history on this course.
JESPER PARNEVIK: Yeah. Has he won here once or twice?

Q. Twice.
JESPER PARNEVIK: He loves it here and I got my work cut out even though I have a 3-shot lead. It's going to be a challenge. I know that. No doubt about it. More internal, mental challenge than anything else but we'll see.
NELSON SILVERIO: All set? Jesper, thanks.

End of FastScripts

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