DORAL-RYDER OPEN

March 7, 1997

Steve Elkington

STEVE ELKINGTON: I started my round on the back 9 today. Parred 10, parred 11. Birdied 12, driver 2-iron, 7-iron, 10 feet birdie. Short of the green on 13, chipped up about 6 feet, par. Parred 14. 15, par. 16, 2-iron, wedge, 20 feet, birdie. 17, driver, sand wedge, three feet birdie. 18, I drove in the fairway bunker, chipped out and I hit a wedge on, missed about a 6 footer for par there. That was the only bogey I made today. Birdied 1, drove until the fairway bunker, hit a 7-iron out hit a wedge about 15 feet out made a birdie. 2 par. 3 par. 4, up-and-down out of the bunker on 4, tap in. 5 I hit a 3-wood, 6-iron about 10 feet, birdie. 6, par. 7, par. 8 I hit a driver, 2-iron on the left fringe and made a probably 40-footer with about five foot of fringe, eagle. And then parred 9, 6-iron, 30 feet.

STEVE ELKINGTON: I had 210 yards to carry the water on the left. And about 235 or 40 yards to the flag. But I was really just trying to shoot to the left, sort of where I did, just to try to finish on the front left somewhere, the wind was sort of helping a little bit off the left. I made sure I tried to keep it far enough left, if I finished in the bunker it would have been all right. It got a nice kick and ran around to stay in the fringe.

STEVE ELKINGTON: Not really. I haven't been playing that much golf, obviously. This is my second tournament of the year. The reason I haven't been playing, I've been home with my wife. We had a baby last Tuesday, a little boy. So I've been home with her. And I really just wanted to stay there and get that -- make sure everything was settled at the house. We have two children under 2 now. Our little girl is not 2 yet. So we've got one -- so it's pretty hectic around the house at the moment. I did play Pebble, I went to Thailand and played, where I lost my clubs, I think everyone knew that. I got two sets of clubs gone, two babies, two kids under two. Everything is twos.

STEVE ELKINGTON: That would be good. I'll be for that. But I think -- I feel like in the preliminary stages of the year for me, working really hard on my health, when I say that I've just been taking care of myself. I've been working out a little bit, feel pretty fit. So even though I've been home well the wife and family I've been thinking about the TOUR and trying to prepare myself, been doing a lot of practice. And I went back out and got some new equipment, which everything is fine with my clubs. The first time I lost them was a lot worse than the second time. Pretty much after I lost them the first time I made sure the second time that I had other backups. So I was quite comfortable there with the set I have now, so there's no problem there, other than just losing them.

STEVE ELKINGTON: Well, after I lost the initial set it was difficult to get the next set, because I didn't exactly know the weight and everything of every club in the bag. When I finally got my next set, I made another set, which is what I've got now.

STEVE ELKINGTON: Yes.

STEVE ELKINGTON: The first loss was in January '96, that was the set that I played with my whole career, basically. It was in Houston.

STEVE ELKINGTON: Yeah. And then I was in Thailand, Jaime was over there, and played with 9 clubs over there against Tiger Woods. I told him that I'd give him two shots a day. He'd have to give me two shots a day with my clubs, and he'd beat me by 12.

STEVE ELKINGTON: His balls, his wedge, his driver. And some lady's set.

STEVE ELKINGTON: I'm not playing next week, and then I'm going to play four at in a row, Bay Hill, TPC, New Orleans and The Masters. And then I'm going to top Hilton Head off and Greensboro and Houston.

STEVE ELKINGTON: No, I felt last year I never sort of got going. I hate to admit it but the clubs were a distraction. I don't say I hate to admit it. I think that the clubs were a distraction for me in the beginning of the year, because I was really pretty lost there for a while. I finally got on track in the middle of the year not worrying about that. And I played good the rest of the year. I just didn't play that much golf that year. I'm not sure why, actually. I probably played more golf this year, the TOUR Championships is at my home course in Champions, which that's a real easy golf for me to obviously get back in the top 30 money winners, to try and play at home, that would be a nice way to finish the year. Obviously I want to play good in the big tournaments. I want to try to get prepared as much as I can for the big tournaments coming up. But I wasn't very prepared coming into this week and I've played well. So I'm pleased with the way I've played so far.

STEVE ELKINGTON: I think it's over done, to be honest. I think they could have done with a little less than what they -- what Raymond changed. That's just my opinion. I think the fairway is a little too narrow. And I think the back bunker is a little too severe, because you can hit it in the water out of the back bunker easily. I think it could be easily fixed. I think consensus across the board is saying 18th hole is a little too severe. I don't think it's me or anyone else, most of the fellows are saying that. And I've been pretty lucky, we played this yesterday where you could actually go over the bunker in the morning and we played it into the wind in the afternoon and played it left to right, it was kind of awkward and they put the tee forward. Maybe one less bunker on the right or maybe a little less severe in the back bunker would be nice.

STEVE ELKINGTON: Off the tee?

STEVE ELKINGTON: I think I was until the second one. I didn't have any option, I had to just chip out, really.

STEVE ELKINGTON: I chipped out with a wedge, I had like a hundred yards or something like that.

STEVE ELKINGTON: It's about 50/50. But there's a lot of rocks in there. There's a lot of rocks in the bunker. My group -- we've been in a lot of sand, a lot of rocks, a lot of little stones and things coming up. It's hard to feel confident about really knowing there's nice sand. It's a bit uneven at the moment.

STEVE ELKINGTON: I was up on the face, I had no chance getting on the green. Even if I would have I probably wouldn't have gone. The pin was in the front today and it was into the wind, it was an easy shot where you could hit it in the water or the bunker. I think most guys are going to try to play down the middle and hopefully it stays in the fairway and if it goes in the bunker they can play the hole with wedges and make two pars. You beat the field if you play it in two bogeys, two pars. If you play it in 18 you beat the field for the week, probably. What did it average yesterday?

STEVE ELKINGTON: Yeah. But it played as easy as it's going to play yesterday.

STEVE ELKINGTON: I'm not sure. I'm sure he's probably made a difference to everyone. I think he's got everyone's attention. But I think most of the guys know what they -- like for me, I didn't try to get in good shape because Tiger was playing the TOUR. But you do want to see if you can perform well. And you know that Greg Norman is probably the fittest guy we have out here, he works real hard. And Nick Faldo, he's working real hard. It's not just Tiger Woods. Tiger Woods says he wants to win every week. There's probably a lot of guys that say they want to win every week. I'm sure Greg Norman wants to win every week. I know Nick Faldo wants to win every week. But Tiger Woods is a super, super player. I'm a big fan. I've been around him not very much, but after seeing him play, I think he's an unreal player. I think he'll be a major factor at certain times this year. I'm not sure where, maybe they're going to be at the majors, but he'll be -- it's not easy to just turn your game on and off. He's done it pretty good. But it's going to be -- it's hard to really pinpoint your game exactly when you want it.

STEVE ELKINGTON: I haven't been out here, to be honest, so I don't know. But he was pretty impressive when he played at Pebble. I think the best thing about Tiger, I think the most impressive thing to me about him, with all the stuff going on around him he can concentrate. And that's the same as Greg, and that's the same as Faldo. And complete bedlam is going on he seems to play pretty good. I mean just like the pairing he had at Pebble. Everyone else would have been shooting 80 every day with everything going on, but he was able -- and Jack Nicklaus is probably the other one, probably those three. Just complete chaos going on around them and they play good. It's hard to do that.

STEVE ELKINGTON: I just -- my back had been bothering me a little bit so, I went through the back rehab at the end of the year, went down to the sports fitness place that all the Rockets use. I didn't have anything wrong with my back, other than I just had a bit of extra weight and was getting too tired. I worked what they wanted me to do, all the exercises, and doing riding the bike, and strengthened my stomach, and my back, and I ended up losing weight. So my back feels good, feels strong.

STEVE ELKINGTON: They're all there now.

STEVE ELKINGTON: No, they were all healthy then. But they're probably all down there now. I probably lost about, I don't know, probably 10 or 15, maybe no more. My weight kind of goes up-and-down a little bit.