U.S. SENIOR WOMEN'S AMATEUR CHAMPIONSHIP

September 22, 2005

Diane Lang

Q. Your first USGA Senior Women's Amateur Championship, where did you qualify?

DIANE LANG: I qualified at Isleworth. I thought home of Tiger Woods, might be my one chance to play that golf course and maybe see him. I didn't see him but it was still a great golf course.

Q. Did you see his house?

DIANE LANG: Nobody pointed that out to me. They said it was a big secret. I asked and nobody would tell me. All I heard was off of the practice range and that was it. Still don't know where he lives.

Q. So you qualified at Isleworth, then you did you play much golf in this part of the country, the northeast, with the hilly terrain?

DIANE LANG: It's not totally new but the only time I got to play it was the first year on TOUR when I played a few tournaments, when I played the U.S. Open, I played Baltusrol. So I played it but we're talking about 20 years ago so.

Q. You spent how many years as a professional?

DIANE LANG: 1983 to 1986.

Q. Tell us how you lost your card on the LPGA Tour.

DIANE LANG: Nine weeks and my husband decided to come along for two of the weeks, Paris, because that was our honeymoon spot and then on to Portugal for maybe a little bit of sunshine. But when I got to Portugal, I was pulled into a room by the gestapo and was told I needed a Visa, which I didn't have. I was still traveling on my Jamaican passport at that time. So my two options, they told me were go to LPGA and do not pass go or get back on the plane. So I took the latter option and flew back to London without my husband, without my bags, crying all the way, and ended up missing the tournament. And then my husband said, you know, honey, this isn't all bad. We're in London, you have the week off. We never get to see each other, so just rent a car and travel south. So great dinner, and I was pregnant and for the next 20 years

Q. You didn't keep your card because of something that happened in the tournament?

DIANE LANG: They had come up with a tournament in the white plains and inaudible this was a chance for all of the rookies to maybe do something good. And it was a tournament we were playing two or three golf course, I'm not sure, so I went to dinner the night before and she said, well, all you have to do is dine, is show up get a check and you'll be guaranteed your card and we all laughed. Wouldn't you know it, the next day I showed up at the golf course, which was not the one I was going to play at. And I'm always on time, at least three hours ahead of my tee time, put the two caddies on the back of my cart and headed out to the golf course, which should have been two or three miles away, and maybe 45 minutes later I was still trying to find the golf course. So by the time I got there, my group was hitting their second shot and I was out of the tournament?

Q. And then you're off the Tour and over to Europe. As the children arrived in 1990 or so, you didn't play golf for ten years.

DIANE LANG: No, I didn't. I'm such a competitor that I really if I wasn't going to play at that level, I didn't even feel like playing, you know, and it took a while to get past that. People would ask, so, what do you do, and I couldn't answer, because I was a golfer.

So I was in my mind, not too much; a mom, which is a great thing but I just gave it up for a while. Once my son and daughter were old enough I could get back to it.

Q. So you played a lot of competitive golf in Florida with the Florida Golf Association?

DIANE LANG: The last two years I have.

Q. Have you always pointed to your 50th birthday last November as a time when you would get more serious about competitive golf?

DIANE LANG: I've just been working very hard. When I went there and played at the Swatka (ph) matches last year, I only got to play two days and I played so poorly that I came back to Florida. It was in November, and either I'm going to learn how to play this game or I'm going to quit. I went to the Jim McClean School at Weston and Ted Briskie was a new instructor there. And I met him, so I thought, well, let me just give him one more time. We worked really hard, at least two days a week for the first six months and now it's been one a month or so, but he has really turned my game around.

Q. Did you talk to him this week?

DIANE LANG: Yes, he called me and he's been wishing me good luck and telling me: Now, I know you get a little fast dine, just take it slow, take deep breaths. So yes, he's been keeping track and he said Jim said to say congratulations yesterday.

Q. This is the same Jim McClean who is a legend around Westchester. So now you qualified for the Amateur here, how do you make a decision about which putter you use?

DIANE LANG: Well, the one that's in my bag this week is going to stay there. I think I have to quit changing putters every week.

Q. What's the over and under on the number of weeks where you change that?

DIANE LANG: Well, if you're coming to next year's tournament at Sea Island, take a look in my bag and we can see what's in there.

Q. Do you realize you're the first USGA Champion from Jamaica?

DIANE LANG: You know, I thought that would probably be the case, because when we played golf in Jamaica, there were only two girls that played, my sister and I.

Q. You said your father taught you how to play the game?

DIANE LANG: Yes, my father was a great tennis player. And there was professional tennis in Jamaica, he would have been one, played Davis Cup and he played a lot of good tournaments.

Now when he got a little too old in his 30s, he took up golf and taught himself and taught me when I was 13. So, you know, we were really the only two girls there that played. Now it might be different but I'm not sure. But it was a lot of fun. We had a lot of competition and we played with the boys and we played with the old ladies at that time.

Q. There will probably be a ticker tape parade in the streets of Jamaica.

DIANE LANG: I don't know if anybody will care but we'll let them know.

Q. What coming to Apawamis, what was your goal for the ten days starting with the qualifying?

DIANE LANG: If I were to tell you the truth, my goal was to win.

Q. Did you think could win?

DIANE LANG: I thought I could win.

Q. Why did you think you could win?

DIANE LANG: Because I've been hitting the ball so well. And the only thing that could have held me back was my putting. And that had me really petrified with the greens and the slopes and the speed, which I'm not accustomed to.

Q. Plus you're more accustomed putting on bermuda, too.

DIANE LANG: Sure. This is totally foreign to me. You know, I went to left hand low for the short putts and regular for the long putts and it seemed to work. I just kept that in my mind, one match at a time.

Q. The match against Carolyn Creekmore, you finished second of course in the qualifying, but the key test game in the quarterfinals of course is when you faced the defending champion.

DIANE LANG: Oh, yes, that was a very tough match. She is one heck of a player. I just have to really concentrate and again, I knew that there were some longer holes on the back nine. For me, that's always the thing, just wait for that back nine.

Q. And then something happened in that match that interested the observers, you seemed to have trouble controling 110 to 130 yard shots, was that in decision, wrong clubs?

DIANE LANG: Totally second guessing myself. I had the right club each time and each time there were four different occasions and I put it back thinking I was hitting the ball so well, I would try one less club coming up the hill and four out of four times I failed. Came up short and cost me the hole. So today after that, I just decided, I'd rather be long than short and just go ahead and swing.

Q. The match today with Carol Semple Thompson, who of course is seeking her record eighth woman's championship, a record tying woman's championship in a USGA event, earlier on you jumped to a 2 up lead and went to the fourth hole and the next few holes you sealed to get caught a little bit?

DIANE LANG: When I overclubbed on the par 3, it's the same club that I hit all week, 8 iron. I knew what it was and then I hit it and it just took off. Kind of shook me up because I had a really tough putt. And this morning on the driving range, my driver wasn't working real well, so there was a little voice in the back of my head on each drive giving me instructions instead of just swinging.

And when I hooked it, that's my that's my bad shot. It was like the wheels were coming off and I'm going, "Oh, God, please don't get into this, don't start hooking the ball." It took me a while to get it back the next drive I hit a good drive that settled me down a little bit.

Q. On the eighth hole. But you suddenly find yourself 1 down after halving the eighth hole, you hit a real good pitching wedge or short shot into 8, but then on 9 you hit another poor pitch shot, what club was that?

DIANE LANG: 9 was a pitching wedge. And who knows, I mean, I guess I just came out of it a little bit. Didn't swing down into the ball. You know, my usual guiding shot, and it came up short and left me with a horrible, horrible putt. One of those that I had no clue how much break to give it. So I was kind of hitting and hoping, and of course, she was up there much closer to the hole.

Q. Then the match seems to turn completely the first of several diabolical turns on 14 when you're out there 110 yards or so, and Carol had hit her shot just past the flag, leaving herself about a 12 foot downhiller, but you hit the shot of the tournament on that particular hole, which was not an underclubbed shot.

DIANE LANG: Not an underclubbed shot. I went with one more than I thought I would need and it was perfect. If I can bottle that shot, I'll be ready for next year.

Q. That was the pitching wedge that you hit for a conceded birdie that putt you back 1 up in the match.

DIANE LANG: Yes, I knew that was going to be a little turn to the match, because she hit a good shot in, it just went a little past, and once you're past on that hole, it's very tough to stop that.

Q. That put you even in the match.

DIANE LANG: Even in the match, exactly.

Q. Then on 15, Carol found the rough now twice in the last four holes, 15 and 18, left herself in a tough position to get to greens, or keep balls on the green?

DIANE LANG: And 15 is my hole. That's my hole. That's where I've turned, I don't know how many matches, because not all the women can reach, and if you're on the right side where Carol was, then you don't have a shot. You need to be left.

So that's where I aimed off the tee and it went right in the middle and gave me a good shot. And when I saw her hit her second shot in that bunker, I've been down there in the practice round and one thing I said, you do not want to be in that bunker.

Q. You're the first person in the history of Apawamis ever to say that the 15th hole is your hole. Most people would like to go from 14 to 16. You both were in the pot bunker on 16 and made bogey and then on 17, 1 up, Carol had laid up in front on the par 5 leaving herself about 110 yards to a very tough back pin position and there you are in the middle of the fairway, about 230 yards or so from the green and a tight back pin and you didn't lay up.

DIANE LANG: No, sometimes at my club, they call me "John" for my middle name because I'm like John Daly. I do not see anything but net, whack it, gets me into a lot of trouble, but occasionally when it works out, it works so good. I didn't even think about it. I hit that shot almost every day.

Q. And you're about 40 feet from the flag, Carol hits in there about 25 feet and people are saying, well, dine hits a little 2 putt here and Carol misses and we have a hands shake, but then what happens?

DIANE LANG: You have to remind me about this hole, because Carol when I made my first putt, my thoughts were keep it on the green and I had another big right to left break, and of course, being as nervous as I was and I left it about six feet short thinking, there's no way. I mean, she'll be lucky to 2 putt. That's the kind of player she is, the champion that she is, and she knocked it right in the back of the cup and scared the hell out of me. So I went ahead and proceeded to miss my short putt.

Q. Which, of course, brings us even going to the 18th tee and Carol then has the honor, and did you know that her ball on 18 was in the rough?

DIANE LANG: Oh, yes, once I saw her hit it off the tee, I knew what was down there. So that kind of got me energized and I thought, well, from that rough, that's not an easy shot.

Q. Particularly not an easy shot any other pin placement on the green, it's an easier shot because you have plenty of green to work with, and the pin being on the front left, to get it within 40 feet it would have been remarkable, she was about 60 feet or 70 feet.

DIANE LANG: She hit a great shot from the rough because the rough here is tough for a woman to get out of.

Q. And then here you are two days ago, imagined yourself underclubbing and hitting perhaps erratic wedges and now you're faced with the wedge of a lifetime.

DIANE LANG: Yes, and I just, said take it to the pin, don't be afraid and put your best swing on it and it worked out.

Q. Sure did, 12 feet, 13 feet behind the Cup?

DIANE LANG: Yes.

Q. And then Carol 3 putted. What did it feel like to have a 2 1/2 foot putt to win the United States Senior Women's Amateur Championship?

DIANE LANG: It's going through my mind: This is what you practice on the green every day, just watch the number that's on the ball, from one of the girls on the Florida team gave me that tip.

Q. Did it have a 6?

DIANE LANG: No, it was a 4. I does switch back to a 4 because the 3 was not behaving on the front nine, so we changed that quickly at No. 10, and it worked.

Q. And that putt went in and the celebration begins.

DIANE LANG: The celebration began.

Q. What's next for you?

DIANE LANG: Next for me will be a week without touching one single golf club. I am ready to relax and it's going to be my daughter's 13th birthday coming up, so she's decided she wants a big party with boys, so I'll be going home to help plan that party.

Q. Diane Lang, 2005 USGA Senior Women's Amateur champion. How does that sound?

DIANE LANG: It sounds fantastic. I can't wait to see everybody back home and just to be back there, but it's been a wonderful week. I'll never forget this. This will go down as a highlight in my life.

Q. Enjoy it?

DIANE LANG: Thank you.

Q. 365 more days.

DIANE LANG: Thank you.

End of FastScripts.