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FBR OPEN


February 2, 2006


Bo Van Pelt


SCOTTSDALE, ARIZONA

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Bo Van Pelt, thanks for joining us. Good round today, 5 under par, off to a good start. Let's get some opening comments. You played with Steve Lowery who also played well at 6 under par.

BO VAN PELT: We had a pretty solid day, hit a lot of fairways and greens and both made some putts and we had some chances. He bogeyed 8 and I bogeyed 9, and those were the two only bogeys of the day, so we had pretty good momentum going early.

I made a good par save on 11, my second hole of the day, just kind of got me off on the right foot. Instead of getting over par early I was able to stay even and made three birdies to close out the back nine.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: With the weather looking like it's going to get even better, how important is it to get off to a good start this week where the scores will probably be low?

BO VAN PELT: Very important. You don't want to go out and shoot even par or 1 over. It puts you behind the 8 ball because you know there's going to be guys that are going to play good every day. It's kind of like a Nationwide event. You want to stay pretty close to the lead if you can.

Greens are rolling really nice, and once we made the turn and it started heating up, the ball started going a long way, so that's going to make the par 5s pretty easy if you drive it in the fairway.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: You kind of established yourself on Tour now the last couple of years. I don't know if you set any specific goals for this year.

BO VAN PELT: Yeah, my goal every year is every part of my game gets better. I just try to take stock where my game was at at the end of last year and try to make it better. I figure if I do that, the results will take care of itself. Obviously you want to win out here. I think that's everybody's goal. I haven't done that yet, but my attitude is I'm just trying to put myself in that position enough times that one of those Sundays is going to be my day.

Q. How do you feel the course is playing?

BO VAN PELT: You know, actually I came out here a couple weeks ago. I felt like the rough was almost higher. I felt like I thought it was going to be really high when I got here, and it's high, but overall the course is in really good shape. The fairways aren't running too fast yet so guys are going to hit a lot of fairways. The greens have firmed up since Tuesday. I didn't play in the Pro Am yesterday, and I noticed that right off the bat, that you had to play for more bounce as the ball was coming into the greens. That's a little bit of defense.

But overall I think the scores are going to be really low this week.

Q. When you come to a place and they say they haven't had rain in 106 days, do you try to imagine obviously they're going to take care of the golf course, but

BO VAN PELT: Yeah, it's hard to believe. I guess I can kind of relate. I live in Oklahoma and it was kind of the same scenario, just kind of uncharacteristically hot and dry all winter. I know the greens staff. I talked to the greenskeeper yesterday and they weren't thrilled about where the greens were, but I told them that they were really good for what they had been through. My hats go off to them because the course is in pretty good shape. And they've got a lot of rough for that, too. You would think a course that only had 106 days dry, it would be dirt out there, but the course is in good shape.

It all just depends on the weather. Last year was kind of cold and windy, and I think that keeps the scores up. But you have four days like this, there's just too many holes out there where guys have short irons in. If you drive it in the fairway, you give guys wedges and 9 irons, you can put the pin wherever you want and guys are still going to make birdie.

Q. What were you doing here a couple weeks ago? Just visiting?

BO VAN PELT: Came out to practice a little bit. Sometimes it's like rolling the dice on that weather in Oklahoma, so I figure I knew it would be pretty nice out here, so I just came out to practice before Hawaii.

Q. Can you talk about the difference between 16 on Thursday versus Sunday?

BO VAN PELT: Well, we kind of got a break today. When you start early on No. 10, you know that there's not going to be that many people there. They were just starting to show up as we went through. But I think it's a great hole. I look forward to it. It's the one time a year you get to feel like a football or a basketball player, what they go through all game.

So it's fun. You know, you just take it in stride and hope you hit a good shot. They like to see good shots there, and they don't like to see bad ones.

But it's fun. I know everybody out there seems like they're having a good time, and I look forward to playing the hole. It's pretty cool.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Bo Van Pelt, thanks.

End of FastScripts.
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