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ARNOLD PALMER INVITATIONAL PRESENTED BY MASTERCARD

March 15, 2008

Tiger Woods

ORLANDO, FLORIDA

Q. Little better today?
TIGER WOODS: Yeah, it was a lot better today. Certainly hit the ball a lot more clean today and I was controlling my trajectory. I really had to control my trajectory, especially in this wind. If you don't hit the ball, you know, well today, you can shoot a pretty high number pretty easily.

Q. You set yourself up obviously for tomorrow, and Vijay is coming back into the mix, put yourself into a good position heading into tomorrow.
TIGER WOODS: Yeah, as of now I'm only two back, which is nice, so I've played myself right back in the tournament.
Hopefully tomorrow I can hit the ball a little better than I did today and make some more putts.

Q. You mentioned you were going to work last night --
TIGER WOODS: Worked on it last night and this morning. Felt like I had a pretty good handle on what I needed to do today.

Q. What did you think when you saw the leaderboard?
TIGER WOODS: To be honest with you, I had not seen a board the entire way around until 18. I could have taken a look on 16 but decided not to. Just didn't feel like it. I felt like, you know, it's a hard enough hole as it is, I didn't feel like I had to go 3-2-3 to get myself back in the tournament.

Q. What did you think when you finally saw it?
TIGER WOODS: I was surprised Vijay lost that many shots, but also not surprised that the guys are making bogeys out there. The wind is blowing pretty hard out there, and he hit just had a couple little miss-hit shots, which in this wind, eat it up.

Q. How about Sean O'Hair, 7-under today.
TIGER WOODS: Pretty impressive. Obviously feeling very confident after last week, and he just got it going. The pins are really not that difficult out there. They are a little more generous today than they normally are on the weekend. If you get it going ball-striking-wise, you can have chances at a lot of birdies.

Q. Almost seems like you can try --
TIGER WOODS: Well, you can't in the sense that if you hit good putts, they are going to bounce off line. It is what it is. The whole idea is to make sure you don't leave yourself a second putt.

Q. You left yesterday obviously frustrated coming up short. What did you do in particular?
TIGER WOODS: To be honest, I didn't do a thing because the greens have picked up pace. They were faster than they were yesterday, and about the same as they were the first day.
So I went out with the same feel as I had on the first day and just tried to maintain that feel all the way around.

Q. Waking up seven shots back, did you expect something like this to play out after you got done today, where you are at now?
TIGER WOODS: Well, I thought the lead might end up at eight or nine, but I thought it had been difficult for guys that had the lead, like Vijay had the lead, to go out and shoot 3-, 4-, 5-under par. The way the wind is picking up right now, it's going to be a little difficult to do that.

Q. Can you talk about Arnold talking to you on the range today?
TIGER WOODS: Well, I saw AP just before in the locker room. He came out and watched me hit a few shots. He liked what I was doing to my swing and just, "Keep going, and you're headed down the right path. Just go out there and shoot a low one today."

Q. Nick Watney is atop the leaderboard; what do you know about him?
TIGER WOODS: I don't think I've ever played with Nick. Only thing I know, I think my buddy, Jerry played with him at AT&T one year. (Laughter) that's about it.

Q. What will you do now to prepare for tomorrow?
TIGER WOODS: I'm going to go home and work out a little bit.

Q. Will you go to the game, it's on at 6 locally.
TIGER WOODS: No, but I'll be in the gym watching it on TV.

Q. Does this energize you?
TIGER WOODS: I feel good. I just wanted to get myself back in the tournament. I was on the periphery there, seven back. As of now, I'm only two back and I'm right back in the mix. A good round tomorrow can win the tournament, instead of having to go out and shoot a great round to hopefully win the tournament.

Q. What did you do on 8 and how close were you to pulling that off?
TIGER WOODS: I was probably about maybe one or two yards of pulling that off. I had 115 to the front and had an 8-iron. I was just trying to play kind of a low hook, and I just need to carry that lip and missed that second bunker, which I hit up in, and if I would have just missed that, probably would have rolled all the way to the back end of the green.

Q. Confidence that you can put this away tomorrow?
TIGER WOODS: Well, as I said, I'm back in the tournament. So it's nice to have to go out there and play a good round of golf and win the tournament instead of having to play a great round of golf to hopefully get myself back in the mix. I did the work today to get myself back in the tournament.

Q. You're two back, but are you psychologically sort of tied or ahead?
TIGER WOODS: I'm two back. Two back's two back.
There's a bunch of guys now. We are all bunched there. Obviously Sean playing well last week, got a bunch of confidence and played well today. And obviously Nick is place playing well out there. Tom Lehman, he's playing well, lots of experience. So we'll see what happens tomorrow.

Q. How wide open is it?
TIGER WOODS: Very wide open. A bunch of guys have a chance. If the wind blows like it did today, then it will be very interesting tomorrow.

Q. What about the approach shot on 16?
TIGER WOODS: Yeah, I had 162 to the hole and I hit a 6-iron in there. Just tried to hit it right up into the green and hold it just a touch and worked out perfect.

Q. What was your best shot of the day?
TIGER WOODS: Probably the shot on 15, and probably 16. 15, I had 187. I hit a four-and got the ball in the left bunker and let the wind bring it back over and it worked out perfect.

Q. Were you?
TIGER WOODS: In the fairway.

Q. Anything specific that you want to do tomorrow that you didn't do today?
TIGER WOODS: Yeah, shoot a lower score.

Q. Your distance --
TIGER WOODS: It's funny you said that, because Stevie said, how in the hell did you pull that shot off.

Q. Did you have an answer?
TIGER WOODS: No, I didn't. I said, if I knew how to do it, I would do it more often. You just try and gauge it. I had a downgrain lie there and it helped a lot. Ingrain lies, you can't get to the green. That one was downgrain, so I had a chance at it.

End of FastScriptsÃ¢ï¿½Â¦

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