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WGC BRIDGESTONE INVITATIONAL

July 31, 2008

Daniel Chopra

AKRON, OHIO

CHRIS REIMER: We want to thank Daniel Chopra for joining us here at the World Golf Championships Bridgestone Invitational, first round 3-under par. Just open by talking about your day out there.
DANIEL CHOPRA: Well, actually didn't really know what to expect. I never played here before. Today was my first round other than the two practice rounds I played. Pretty tough golf course, really.
So I tried to play as conservative as I possibly could. If I could get the ball in the fairway, try to put it somewhere in the middle of the green and try and two-putt from there. That's pretty much what I did all day. I just made the one bogey and the four birdies.
I actually played quite well. Been working on a few things. Took some time off after Buick and came back to here and just been working on a few things trying to get myself a little bit more consistent. So not overly confident starting the week just because you're playing the first round with some reasonably major changes, not huge, but enough to make you feel uncomfortable. But it worked out pretty well today, and hopefully -- every round I play I feel more and more comfortable, so hopefully by the weekend I should be pretty good.

Q. What characteristic about the golf course stood out most to you today?
DANIEL CHOPRA: Well, the length, for one. The awkwardness of trying to get the ball in the fairway. You can see how the golf course was built for a ball that went about 30 yards shorter. We were hitting in all the real awkward spots. Very difficult to put the ball in the fairway for the longer hitters and making it a little bit softer with the rain yesterday made it a little bit easier to put the ball and find those areas. But you can see when those get firm and fast, it'll be very, very difficult.

Q. You said you took some time off. What kind of things were you working on? In your swing?
DANIEL CHOPRA: Yeah, it was swing. It was just things to try and get myself just a little bit more consistent. I was a little bit inconsistent all year long, really, with my game. Even so, every tournament I had two good rounds and two bad rounds or three good rounds and a bad round. Even within a good round I'd have some shots that really shouldn't be hit considering how well I'd been playing that day. So I'm trying to smooth it all out a little bit and get a feel and a general idea for how the day is going to be before I even start. It was a little bit of a mystery all day long today.

Q. You mentioned that some of the changes were enough to make you feel a little bit uncomfortable.
DANIEL CHOPRA: Yes.

Q. Which ones were they?
DANIEL CHOPRA: The major one. I'm not going to go into what I was doing, but what I was doing, it was just one thing that I was working on, which was -- one of the things were -- it does make you feel uncomfortable. It's in the setup, and it makes you feel that the ball can be going a particular direction.

Q. So it was ball position?
DANIEL CHOPRA: It wasn't ball position, it was more in the setup. You're afraid of one side of the golf course a little bit. So being able to trust it is the hard thing sometimes.

Q. You mentioned looking down a fairway and seeing where the course was made for a ball that went 30 yards shorter. Can you describe what it is that you saw that told you that?
DANIEL CHOPRA: Well, the typical example is the 4th hole. It's a dead bowling alley straight hole up to about 270 and then all of a sudden the fairway leans at a 45-degree angle. If the fairways are firm and fast or even normal, every ball right of center has no chance of staying in the fairway, it'll run over into the left rough. But with the old persimmon headed driver and the old balata, 270, 280, you will reach the beginning of where it starts to slope right to left, so it's not an issue. For us now it is.
On holes like No. 9 and No. 18, 18 is another very good indicator. They've lengthened that hole, I believe, but even so, the way that hole is shaped, the ball kicks on down to the right and doglegs to the left. And then No. 9 is about the same. There's a couple other holes, as well, where it's -- the actual landing area, you see a fairway in front of you, but the actual landing area is 10 yards or 15 yards to the right of what you see, and that's blind, because it kind of goes up over the rise. Then once it disappears, then the dogleg starts and the fairway changes. So it kind of throws you because you see the fairway right in front of you, but where you actually have to land it looks like it's in the trees or in the rough line.
So you really have to know your lines off the tees and trust that the fairway is over there.

Q. That's the designer playing with your head, right?
DANIEL CHOPRA: I guess a little bit to do with that, as well. But I don't think that when he designed the golf course he was thinking balls are going to be flying into those areas that we're aiming at. I think you can actually tell where you can see fairway right now is in the 240 to -- well, up to 270 or 280 is where you can see fairway. I could only just imagine how long this golf course would have been from those areas. If you actually played the ball into those areas where you can see where the ball would have been going 10 years, 15 years ago, you'd be hitting 2-irons and 3-irons and woods into just about all the par-4s.
We were talking about it the other day, about how we can't believe how JosÃ© MarÃa shot 18-under around here. That was pretty special considering the ball he was using back then and the clubs. The golf course wasn't really that much shorter than it is today.

Q. Have you done much homework on next week's site?
DANIEL CHOPRA: Well, I played British Open qualifier there I think it was last year. In my mind I thought it was the toughest golf course I had ever played and still believe that. I played Augusta this year for the first time and Torrey Pines and the U.S. Open, but those don't even come close to how hard Oakland Hills will play.

Q. What makes it so for you?
DANIEL CHOPRA: Well, the fairways are narrow, for one. But really, rough is a non-issue because they've got bunkers on both sides of the fairways and they're deep, and they're not long bunkers, meaning that if you go into them, the front lip of the bunker is always going to be right there. If they're long bunkers and you hit into the bunker, if you're far back enough you can get over the lip and get on the green. These bunkers are all designed small so you roll in, you literally just have to trickle into the bunker and get down to the bottom of the flat to have a chance to reach the green.
Normally at a golf course like a U.S. Open trial golf course if you miss the fairway and you're in the rough, if you get lucky or you carry some kind of a high-lofted wood and you're strong enough you can muscle it on the green or get close. You can't do that at Oakland Hills. Everybody is going to be in those bunkers and hacking it out at the greens. They're as severe as Augusta National, I'd say, almost, and if they get them firm and fast, tough to do in August with the thunder storms and all that. And it's long, as well, so you can't really take irons off the tee to try and put the ball in the fairway, you have to hit the driver.

Q. How did you play that day?
DANIEL CHOPRA: I did not qualify. I played fairly well and I finished poorly my last five holes. But I drove the ball beautifully just to be maybe -- I think I was 1-under or whatever for the round or even par through the first 12 or 13 holes, and I was thinking, wow, this is the best driving I've done just to be able to be around par. I could only imagine what it would be like if you struggled off the tee.
CHRIS REIMER: Daniel, thank you very much. Good luck.

End of FastScripts

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