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MASTERS TOURNAMENTApril 10, 2008Brandt SnedekerAUGUSTA, GEORGIA CLAUDE NIELSEN: Ladies and gentlemen, it's a great pleasure to welcome back Brandt Snedeker. This is his second Masters appearance, as you know, and he had just a terrific round today, 3-under par. Congratulations on your opening round. BRANDT SNEDEKER: Thanks. CLAUDE NIELSEN: You want to give us a few highlights and then we'll take some questions. BRANDT SNEDEKER. Sure. I will just go with the birdies. I birdied No. 9. I hit a good 6-iron in there to about 25 feet just right of the hole and made a big, curling snake putt. Kind of got my round going. If I had missed the hole, would have been six or seven feet by and glad to see it going in. And made about a 25-footer on 10 after hitting a great 3-iron to the green from about 230. 12, was just kind of a nice little chippy 8-iron right in the middle of the green, hit it right where I was trying to hit it about ten feet left of the hole and made a great putt. And the green is a little beat up back there and hit a nice, firm putt right in the middle. 15, hit a great bunker shot to about six or eight feet and made that putt. So it was kind of a good day ball-striking-wise, and 18 was the only bogey. Got kind of a bad break and got mud on my ball in the fairway on 18 and hit a great 5-iron, wherever I was trying to hit it and carried farther than it should have, knuckled it with that mud on it and hit a good pitch shot and just didn't make the putt. So 3-under par and looking forward to tomorrow. CLAUDE NIELSEN: Congratulations. Questions? Q. Early in the morning, we watched the scores kind of stay like 1 and 2 and Poulter had a hole-in-one; what happened in the afternoon, did conditions get a little better? BRANDT SNEDEKER: I don't really know. I couldn't really answer that. I don't know how it was this morning. I thought the course played very fair. They certainly had some pins that you could go out there -- could go after today. 15 being a back pin is normally a go-after pin. 16 being where it was was kind of a chance to make a birdie. There's a few pins you can go after, so that was very nice, and they moved a few tees up where it could be really long. So the guys in the afternoon, course dried out a little bit, ball started moving a little further and shorter irons in the greens and the greens were just fantastic, so they were just perfect speed and getting on that borderline of where they want to get them which is very fast, but fantastic. I think the guys in the afternoon had nice, warm weather, perfect conditions, not a whole lot of wind, so we were very lucky today. Q. Did you get a feeling if you could stay out there you could take this thing to double figures? BRANDT SNEDEKER: No, I didn't get that feeling at all. You don't ever get that feeling here I don't think. I definitely didn't mind staying out there and playing. Felt like I was playing great and each hole, could not wait to get to the next one. Q. After 7 you ran over to an official, your putter what was the problem? BRANDT SNEDEKER: I had a piece of rubber, I just had a little piece of rubber lying on the inside of my putter keeping the insert in had come loose, and I noticed it on 7, and it had come off. And so I went over to doublecheck with the officials to make sure it was nothing I had done and just came off from me putting, and I made sure I didn't have to take it out of play or anything like that. They said if it happened in the course of play it's not a penalty and there's no reason to take it out of play. So thank God I got that ruling; otherwise I would be putting with a wedge the rest of the day. I did not have a back-up putter with me. Q. What was the effect -- BRANDT SNEDEKER: It's a rubber lining on the outside of the insert, didn't affect it in any way which is great so not too worried about it. Q. You going to keep putting with it? BRANDT SNEDEKER: Yeah, it will stay in the bag for one more day. So one more day, it will get another day. Q. How was that practice for you last week at Sea Island on those greens? How fast was that green compared to this and how did it get you ready for what you faced? BRANDT SNEDEKER: It was great I was down at Frederica at Sea Island and they had the chipping green going about 13, so I was able to do a lot of practice on big, sloping putts and chipping and figuring out how to nip the ball as good as possible get some spin on it and control my shots. And it was comforting to come here that I had hit a bunch of shorts before and knew how they were going to react and when I on these long, slipping putts here, I hit a bunch last week and felt comfortable with the speed, and it was so nice to come down here and do that. That's where Zach win last year and prepared, and he was down there again this year. Obviously worked well for him, and it worked well for him today again, so hopefully it will do the same for me. Q. On 18, Watson said that back pin is making suckers out of a lot of players trying to go for it. Was it the mud or just adrenaline? BRANDT SNEDEKER: No, I think it was probably a little bit of both. We were probably right in-between clubs and I thought that the you uphill was 205 yards to the pin and can't hit a 6-iron that far. I didn't want to risk mis-hiting a 6 and leaving very it on the front edge. Thought if I just hit a nice, smooth little 5-iron in the middle of the green and chase back there, it would be perfect. Came off a little hot just from that mud and hit it right where you couldn't, and that's going to happen, unfortunately over the course of 72 holes, you will hit in some spots where you don't want to be. I did the right thing, I got it back out there and a 10-footer for par and didn't go in. If that's as bad as it gets, missing a 10-footer for par, me making a mistake, I'll be more than happy with that. Q. Talk about your patience on the first eight, you had three or four makeable birdie putts that didn't go in? BRANDT SNEDEKER: That's going to go happen out here. You have a slot of slope in these putts and you are not going to make them all and you just have to stay patient. It's a hard thing to do out here, the greens are so perfect, you feel like you should make every putt and unfortunately they are just so sloped and undulated, you can't. So just realize it's going to be a long day and stay patient. Q. Other than Tiger Woods, I don't really know what the history is of the guys who have made smooth transitions from the time they played as an amateur to the time that they played as a pro. I don't know if you know anything about the history but what is different about you now than when you came here the first time? BRANDT SNEDEKER: Pretty much say everything. That was four years ago. I feel like I'm a lot more mature. I'm a lot more grown up as a professional golfer. I feel like my game is a whole lot better; it's not even close to how much better it is now to what it was then. And I feel mentally prepared. I feel like I put in a lot of hard work and this time I came in with a different mind-set. Last time was to make the cut and enjoy it with my brother and have a great time and use it as a springboard to my pro career. This time, it's come here with one intention only, and that's to win. It's amazing when you shut your mind to different things, how your body reacts and it's been a nice day to go out and be able to do that. Q. Would you have thought four years ago that when you came back here again that you could be in that kind of position? BRANDT SNEDEKER: Yeah, definitely. I definitely have never lacked for confidence for myself. That's one thing, I don't like telling people about it, but you know, I think you'll ask any professional golfer and we all think we can hit every golf shot in the world and we all think on any given day we are the best in the world. Granted with Tiger Woods now, everybody kind of doesn't, you know -- we are not the best golfer, one day; over four days, we are not the best golfer in the world anymore. (Laughter) that's the way it is. Q. When you played last year at Torrey Pines and you played so well and you're in the field with Tiger there, what did that do to sort of basically jump that confidence up for you and let you know you were out here? BRANDT SNEDEKER: It did a world of confidence to be out there my third professional event on the PGA TOUR and to play that well and put myself in position where I was battling for the lead on Sunday on the back nine with Tiger and get to see how well he played and how, you know, why he's the best player in the world, and let me know that I hung in there with him for 72 holes. If I had played a few holes differently here and there, who knows what might have happened. And it makes you go back and kind of refocus on what you're working on and realize that saving shots is the most important thing. It's not the great shots that need to get better, it's your bad shots and you need to learn how to save them when you're not playing great. Just made me realize that I do belong out here with these guys and I can compete with them and if I keep working hard and keep my head down and not pay attention to what's going on around me and worry about my own stuff, I'll be okay. Q. Can you talk about how your time on the Nationwide Tour prepared you for the PGA TOUR and to get you back here? BRANDT SNEDEKER: It was fantastic. I give the Nationwide Tour a bunch of credit, me from an amateur golfer to a professional golfer. Taught me how to travel, prepare, how to manage my time. The biggest thing for a professional golfer is I think is to figure out what to do off the golf course to get yourself ready for the next day. It's very easy to get yourself into some bad habits and have too much fun and not take what you're doing very seriously. I thought the Nationwide Tour did a great job kind of letting me figure out what my balance points were on TOUR how I needed to prepare for golf. You know, I know I would not be here without that kind of -- those two years I spent out there kind of learning about myself and my golf game. Q. Have you gone through the clubhouse, have you snuck backup into the Crow's Nest to see what it was like -- BRANDT SNEDEKER: No, I didn't want to get booted out my next time around sneaking around where I shouldn't be. But I do want to sneak up by the end of the week and see it. I played with Michael Thompson on Tuesday and asked him if those steps were as narrow as they used to be, and I told him not to have too many beers because I don't want him falling down and breaking his neck on the stairs. It's a special experience. Any time, I told those guys, make sure they drink it in, because it was something I look back on and absolutely am so glad I made that decision to come here and stay in the Crow's Nest for a week and it was phenomenal. It's something I'll always look back on and hold close to my heart. Q. You made the cut, and I don't know if you were low amateur or not? BRANDT SNEDEKER: I was not. Casey Wittenberg played great that year. Q. Making the cut as an amateur, does that make a difference when you came back? BRANDT SNEDEKER: Yeah, definitely, I think that was definitely some confidence booster. I think you're first time around this place, you're very nervous. There's so many tough pins, the greens are so much slope in them that you realize that you're going to hit some putts six and eight feet by; and you realize you're going to look foolish a lot; and you realize it's not going to be easygoing, and I think it does a lot to calm you down. I remember in '04 I was nervous the first nine holes before I was able to get out of that funk, and today I was nervous on the first tee shot and I was good to go. Any time you can draw on a good experience you've had, it's always a positive. Q. This is a course when the conditions are right, a player can make a lot of birdies, and you've shown that you can make a lot of birdies in that situation. If maybe the conditions and the fairways firm up a little bit, do you feel like you can have a go at this course and really attack it the next few days or do you have to be careful? BRANDT SNEDEKER: I don't think you ever really attack this golf course. I don't think there's very few guys in the field that feel like they can attack it. I think the way you play this golf course well is to pick your points and realize there's some holes you can be aggressive on and realize that there's holes that sometimes a 40-footer over a slope is a good play and 2-putt and get out of there. You've got to realize that this is not one of the hardest major championships for being an easy test of golf to be able to go out there and go at pins and not worry about where you're going to hit it. You've really got to think yourself around this golf course and realize that par is not necessarily going to hurt you. Over four days, par is your friend. Q. Tiger Woods said there was a feel of it being a U.S. Open out there because there was not a lot of roars. Did you hear anything? BRANDT SNEDEKER: You know, that's a great point. I did not hear hardly any roars today at all. I heard a couple when I was putting. I did not hear the Poulter roar. I can't think where I was on the golf course when it happened. I might have been on the putting green or first couple holes -- actually I was on the third green and heard it, and couldn't figure out where it was or what was going on. I guess that's what this place is famous for is roars. Yeah, there was not a whole lot going on today it seemed like. Q. Especially early. BRANDT SNEDEKER: Especially early, yeah. Hopefully there will be some fireworks tomorrow I guess. Q. You have an extra hour before tee time, what did you do to pass the time? BRANDT SNEDEKER: I tell you, I sat in the locker room up there and they have a little veranda up there and I had a little veranda out there and sat on there veranda and just people-watched for about 45 minutes, it was great. Sat there and relaxed and looked at everybody walking by, everybody going their own way, watching guys play golf. It was kind of fun sitting up there relaxing and watching the world go by, I guess was a good way to put it and have a laugh. Me and Johnson Wagner were sitting up there recollecting a little bit and it was fun. Q. Who did you see when you were people-watching? BRANDT SNEDEKER: I saw some friends from Nashville and some people in the crowd I knew and said hello. Just looking and seeing the way people dress or how they walk. You know how it is, how you sit here, my favorite time in the world sitting in airports and watching people go by. (Laughter). So I was doing that today. I figure what better place to do it than Augusta, Georgia in 78-degree weather and watch people go by and see people who are not wearing sunscreen and people who have had too many beers, that kind of thing. CLAUDE NIELSEN: Thank you and congratulations. End of FastScripts |
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