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THE HONDA CLASSIC

March 7, 2009

Jeff Overton

PALM BEACH GARDENS, FLORIDA

JOHN BUSH: We'd like to welcome Jeff Overton to the interview room here at the Honda Classic. Jeff, there's a lot of different ways to shoot an even-par 70, and you found one of most interesting out there. Just talk about what was a wild day for you.
JEFF OVERTON: You know, it got off to kind of a ho-hum start. Couldn't really get any birdies to drop. A couple good par saves.
Then had a bogey and had a birdie and then had the really bad hole where I dumped a couple of pitching wedges in the water. The first one was trying to muster up a little heart on it and there was though way it had a chance because I didn't have nearly enough club. I thought the wind was completely different from what it was. I thought it was helping but actually it was a little bit of hurt.
Unfortunately the second one, it camped in the water, too. I thought it made it but, oh, well. Kind of sighed of relief at that point, no pressure at that point and not anywhere close to the lead. Just said, let's have fun and fight hard and make some birdies and get ourselves back in this tournament.
Made a nice putt on 14 or something like that and made a couple other good shots and made a putt on 16 for birdie from about eight, 12 feet and missed another one on the next hole and stuck it in there really close on the last hole. So it was awesome to finish like that.
JOHN BUSH: Talk about the third shot on 18.
JEFF OVERTON: It was 105 and the wind was a little into us off the right and in the first cut, and so I knew that a lob-wedge might jump just enough that it would not have quite enough spin on it that it would go through the wind rather than trying to hit an easy gap wedge. Especially with a little extra adrenaline with all of the crowd and everything, I was like, let's just go out and hit a nice, hard, tiny draw with that lob-wedge. We hit it perfect and it went nice and high.
You could tell it wasn't spinning too much. Just came down there right next to the hole and it was kind of what you dreamed about, having all of those people around there supporting the Honda Classic and me being there all in the thick of things.

Q. Do you have to deal with a lot of emotions on a day like today then?
JEFF OVERTON: I mean, absolutely. Any time it's draining mentally, you know you're right there at the top and you know how easy it is to make a huge number out here. You're obviously trying to avoid those mistakes, but you know that they are right there. You've just got to keep plugging away and try to make birdies, because you need to make a few birdies to off-set those bad holes; then you're going to do all right.

Q. If conditions stay like this, what kind of day do you expect tomorrow?
JEFF OVERTON: It's a battle out there. The wind was not quite as bad today. I thought a couple of the par 3s on the back, the tees were moved up just a little bit, but made the pins also closer to the water, so it made them still fairly still really difficult.
I thought today was a little more scorable and if the wind picks up tomorrow, it's going to play tough. It's going to be anybody's -- it's right there within a couple few shots of the lead. It's going to have a chance because like I said, it's easy and you never know when you're going to have a bad hole, especially with those finishing holes.

Q. Is this the kind of day where it might be better to come out of the pack with nobody watching and put an early round up?
JEFF OVERTON: Absolutely. You start the day at 2-under tomorrow and go shoot 5-under, 7-under tomorrow, in the clubhouse, probably looking pretty solid. I mean, especially if the wind is blowing, what have you.
But at the same time, 5-under tomorrow, the golf course is going to be set up as hard as it possibly can be. It's going to be a heck of a round.
Just have to go out there and try to fight through the tough times and try to have fun when it's going good.

Q. You had to fight through some tough times last year, will those kind of things help you tomorrow in recognizing what you've already been through?
JEFF OVERTON: You know, it's such a difficult golf course. You have to ball-strike it so well and grind it out.
I'm playing well. I just have to keep doing what I learned in college and take advantage of my opportunities.

Q. Did you consider hitting out of the muck on 11?
JEFF OVERTON: Yeah, I thought about it and I had this nice, great, white outfit on (laughter). I would rather just go ahead and have the extra shot than get it all muddy. (Laughter).
JOHN BUSH: Jeff, play well tomorrow.

End of FastScripts

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