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BUICK INVITATIONAL

February 6, 2009

Charley Hoffman

SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA

JOHN BUSH: We'd like to welcome Charley Hoffman into the interview room at the Buick Invitational, 6-under par 66 today at a tournament that I know is near and dear to your heart. A comment on the day and also what it means to be in contention here in San Diego.
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: The day started off raining, so I didn't know what to expect, if we were going to get in 18 holes or not. Got off to sort of a slow start, parred the first three holes, which usually you only get one or two on the par-5 and drivable par-4. Then I got it going and birdied 4, 5 and 6 to get the round going. Then I missed a couple on 7 and 8, but on the North Course when it gets a little softer the greens get a little bumpy. I birdied 9, got up there close to the green, which was nice, so I turned at 4-under.
Then unfortunately snap-hooked it into the hazard left on 11 and made a pretty good bogey there. Then coming home I made birdies on 14, 15 and 17, so all in all a pretty solid round.

Q. And you said outside that this is your major right now for the year. Comment on playing in San Diego, born and raised here, and what that means to be in contention.
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: Yeah, I've watched this tournament since I can remember watching golf. I remember coming out here and watching Fuzzy and John Daly and great guys who won 20 years ago. This is my major. I'm not in any majors this year. This is the tournament I want to win, and hopefully I win this and get into a few more majors.

Q. Have you ever felt like you tried too hard in this tournament in the past as far as what you wanted to happen versus what actually happened, and was there frustration in that?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: I wouldn't say I ever tried too hard. I think I control all my emotions a little better now than I used to. If I would have made bogey on 11 a few years ago coming home, I wouldn't have been able to make a few birdies to get it back. I think all in all I'm a more mature player. I was always able to make birdies, just not keeping the bogeys off the card, and two bogeys on these two golf courses this week is pretty good for me.

Q. Any way to estimate how many times you've played these tracks over the years, or were you a country club guy growing up in town or did you do the sleep in the car thing and all that stuff?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: I definitely wasn't a country club guy. My parents became a member of a country club right before high school, so growing up I paid public golf courses, junior golf, events on the North Course and the South Course. Amateur qualifier the day after this tournament is unbelievable. They used to have two spots for the two low amateurs and a special qualifier which is near and dear to my heart because I did that three times, and I gained more experience in those three events as an amateur than I could ever playing mini-Tours or anything like that. I have no clue the number of rounds I've played.

Q. That many, huh?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: A ton. I mean, I have done the get up at 4:00 in the morning and drive over here and get out and try to get off early. It's obviously a fun golf course that all the locals love to play.

Q. Can you talk about the advantages that you and Jason Gore and Paul Goydos have, the advantage that you have on the greens, knowing the course? Do you think there is one?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: Not as much on the South Course because obviously it's a newer golf course. It's not new anymore, but the North Course there's definitely some local advantage, how to putt these greens. I think if you grow up on bumpy, slow poa annua you sort of have an idea how to play them. You're going to miss a few and make a few that you think you're going to miss.
It's like when you go to Florida, you see guys that always play well in Florida, and you see the guys in California always play well on bumpy poa annua.

Q. Are you still riding high, a little buzz after last week? I know it probably didn't end the way you anticipated those last couple playoff holes, but it's basically a T1 technically last week.
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: Am I riding high? No, I wanted to go out and get a W. I want to get in the Masters. I want to play -- it gave me a little more incentive to come out here. Even though it's my home tournament I wanted to get in the Masters and get ready for the end of the year and the FedExCup and play good golf throughout the whole year. So I think it burned a little fire underneath me to get it going and get another W.

Q. What is the carryover? There must be some carryover as far as confidence.
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: There is definitely confidence carryover. I definitely have confidence going this week because last week I got off to a shaky start on the weekend and brought it back in contention, obviously, at the end of the tournament. Like I said, back a few years before, I don't know if I would have been able to do that. At the start of this year I've been doing all right.

Q. Was '96 the year that you made the cut?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: Yeah, I was 18 and I was a freshman in college, so 96 sounds right.

Q. You made the cut?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: Yeah.

Q. What do you remember about that specific year and the experience? Who did you play with, do you remember? How did the weekend go? What was that like, that first time? That was the first time you played on a weekend, right?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: Yeah, that's the first time I made the cut. It was a great experience. What I vaguely remember was warming up on the range and Craig Stadler is to my right and Peter Jacobsen to the left and guys I grew up idolizing, and I'm playing the golf tournament with these guys on the weekend. Unfortunately I didn't play that well on the weekend. My expectations were sort of met once I made the cut, so sort of all the hype was gone. I didn't end up playing that well.
I think I want to say I played with like Franklin Langham and Taylor Smith. Unfortunately Taylor Smith is no longer with us, but those guys were great to me. Like I said, the three times I played as an amateur it was the best experience in golf I've ever had.

Q. How many guys for those two spots would they have on those Monday qualifiers?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: It was limited to 90 guys.

Q. 90 for two?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: 90 for two, so it was a fairly good percentage that you'd get in if you had a decent game. A lot of guys didn't know about it when they were doing it. So it was great for me being from here. You only got mostly San Diego guys, and as the word got out a little bit more, some guys started traveling in to try to do it, but it was an unbelievable thing the Century Club did for the local amateurs.

Q. You won that three times you said?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: Three times.

Q. High school years?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: 16, 18 and 20. I've known Rick since I was 16 -- actually 15. I qualified at 15 and played at 16.

Q. What are you doing well right now? What are you really happy with with the way you're playing?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: I've got the new Titleist D2 driver that's been great. Killing it. Last season I changed shafts, and I don't know what it did, but I picked up 20 yards and I'm hitting it straighter, which is great. I mean, I'm making a few putts. Put me in the fairway, and the majority of the time I'm going to be pretty hard to deal with.

Q. Do you put any stock in the Pat Perez, Paul Casey I-just-got-married thing that seems to be helping, and when was your wedding date?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: I got married November 29th, two weeks before Pat. Obviously there's something do it. Guys are married and winning. I don't think it really has anything to do with anything, really. I don't know.

Q. I'm going to assume your wedding wasn't quite as wild. You were at Pat's, right?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: Yeah, I was at Pat's.

Q. No cake went in the pool or anything like that?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: Pat's wedding was one of the best things I've ever seen. I mean, it was a production. I don't even know if it was a wedding (laughter). There were fireworks and all different stuff. But it was a great time, good group of guys down there. I think my wedding was -- what I say, if you can't invite all your friends to a place and have a party and not have fun, you're never going to have any fun. I couldn't have had more fun at my wedding.

Q. Where was your wedding?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: Estancia just down the road here.

Q. Just talk about weathering the weather storm. It was really hellacious at the beginning, and putting was a little bumpy. Can you talk about just getting through the beginning?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: Yeah, it just came up in and out. The weather was obviously at the beginning pretty bad, didn't know if we were going to -- right when I stepped on the tee it started raining, so the first couple holes played a little tougher than they are right now when it's sunny out. You sort of saw it coming. You could look out on the ocean and saw it raining and you put your rain gear on and you were ready for it, and then five, ten minutes later it was gone. So it wasn't all that bad, but it obviously affected some shots.
JOHN BUSH: Charley, tomorrow should be fun. Play well.

End of FastScripts

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