	products recent interviews FastScripts archive about ASAP Sports

Our Clients:

Browse by Sport

Find us on

Subscribe to RSS

Click to go to
Asaptext.com

View our
e-Brochure

MASTERS TOURNAMENT

April 11, 2008

Stewart Cink

AUGUSTA, GEORGIA

STEWART CINK: Any time you're under 70 here, it's meaningful. I think those other statistics are mostly coincidental. I don't think I've ever shot lower than 69 on this golf course in my life. It takes a good round to shoot anything under par, and then you get in the 60s, you have to really be on out there, and I was. I hit the ball well today, putted a little better than yesterday, and overall I'm pretty pleased with the way I'm playing.

Q. Talk about 16.
STEWART CINK: Yeah, it's tricky to figure out the distance, and then if you just bail by five feet, you have what I had, which is the putt from the upper shelf that's impossible to get within ten feet. It's almost a questionable pin placement, but you know it's there. I didn't handle that one too well. There will be a lot of three-putts from up above that hole.

Q. There's no other way to hit that putt?
STEWART CINK: No, you almost have to hit it sideways and then it pretty much rolls to the fringe.

Q. Did you go up a club or down a club?
STEWART CINK: I went up a club because the wind just kept on coming into us there, even though my compass and the wind direction the whole day didn't indicate it should have been doing that. But I went up a club, and just a bad decision. I told my caddie right before we hit, if we're in between clubs we've got to go with the short one, and I went with the long one.

Q. You hit a great shot into 15, two inches short?
STEWART CINK: Yeah, the putt, yeah. It's always a tricky third shot. I tried to get myself far left so I could play with the hill on the green to stop it, and went a little too far left and got in the rough, which I didn't really mean to do, but I had a good lie, and I hit the third shot exactly how I wanted to. If you can leave yourself an uphill putt there, you've done something pretty good. You hate to leave it short, but a 5 on that hole is not really something to complain about.

Q. On the back could you tell the wind really started to pick up?
STEWART CINK: Yeah, the wind. As you know, Amen Corner is always famous for its tricky wind, and it was there today. It's not blowing real hard but it's just not very consistent and you have to figure out -- because the margin for error is so little that you just have to be exact out there. When the wind turns around, even when it's not blowing too hard, you have to back off and start all over.

Q. When you see you position on the leaderboard, what does it do for you?
STEWART CINK: Anytime you have a good round here and you hit some shots that you -- if you hit the shots you're seeing, then it gives you some confidence. There's some very difficult shots out there, but if you pull them off, it gives you confidence next time and you feel a little more sense of calm. I think it's good to have that experience, to come in with a good round today, and if nothing else, just gives you a good frame of mind to go into the weekend.

Q. Could you talk about the birdies at 5, 8 and 11?
STEWART CINK: 5, my ball could have easily rolled off the mound and gone down to the front right and had an impossible two-putt, but it stayed right on the edge, and I made it. It was a good break.
8, I two-putted for birdie.
11, I was in the right trees, pretty much in jail, but I had an opening sort of high, so I went high and I got a good break. Really the ball was in the pine straw, but I had the right distance for the club to get the ball right through the gap, and I hit it about ten feet and made the putt.

Q. You had to do that twice?
STEWART CINK: Yeah, I had a couple of good breaks. When I hit it in the trees on 11 and 13, I was able to get it up through the gaps as opposed to trying to hit it low and take a chance on going through the trunks. So I went up, and both times I had an opportunity to do that.

Q. When you pull it off is it like, it's going to be a good day?
STEWART CINK: Well, you know, you don't really look ahead and think it's that kind of day. You look back and say, yeah, it was that kind of day.

Q. Do you feel like some of the fun is back in this tournament? The scoring is a little bit lower.
STEWART CINK: The scoring is a little bit better. I think it's mainly because the wind isn't quite as strong as it was last year and the course has a little bit more moisture in it. If it gets windy the rest of the weekend like they're saying it's going to, it's going to be bogeys out there again like it was last time. We've had a little bit more benign weather conditions and the grass has a little bit more moisture.

Q. That suits your game a little bit better?
STEWART CINK: Well, it suits everybody's game a lot better. Obviously the scores are lower. It's a better course, I think, when you can actually play on it. When you're hitting really good shots that just bounce God-knows-where, it's not as good a test as it is like this because good shots are rewarded right now.

Q. As you look forward, don't they set it up a little bit easier for the risk-reward pins?
STEWART CINK: They've started doing that, but you can't say they'll do it this time. They've already used the lower pins on 16 so that's gone. They'll be on the higher parts the next couple days. This is a tournament where they don't typically stay with the same pins year in and year out. There's a couple they like to use, but they're liable to put it anywhere on the greens. It doesn't really matter where they are, it's always an interesting hole location.

Q. Billy Payne did say they try to make it more exciting in the final round. Do they move the tees up?
STEWART CINK: Well, it's kind of depending on the weather. If the weather looks like it's going to be really difficult then they might set the course up a little bit easier. But if it rains and it gets soft, then they might put it in the tougher places. They like to make it exciting, but they don't want every hole to be a funnel where all you have to do is have a pulse and you're going to hit it up there three feet.
They know exactly what's going on out here. They do as good a job setting the course up as any organization in the world, and they'll do it again this year I'm sure.

Q. What was the contrast at 4? Yesterday it was way, way to the back, and it was as far forward as you could make it today. How do you gauge for that?
STEWART CINK: You know it's going to be there. In the practice round they have nets on the tee, and you can see the nets on the front. With that back right pin they've almost always used the up tee. You know it's going to be there, and you don't look back to how it was yesterday or look forward to what it's going to be like tomorrow. You just play the shot that's in front of you.

Q. It was 249?
STEWART CINK: Yesterday it was right around 250, today it was right around 180.

Q. Do you remember what you hit yesterday?
STEWART CINK: 3-iron, 7-iron. Big difference, a lot tougher pin today, as far as, you know, the exacting nature of the shot you had to hit to get it close, and that's why they moved the tees up, plus the OB is a lot closer.

End of FastScripts

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297