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THE PLAYERS CHAMPIONSHIP

May 7, 2009

Richard S. Johnson

PONTE VEDRA BEACH, FLORIDA

MARK WILLIAMS: Richard, good playing today, 6-under, 66, PLAYERS Championship. Thanks for coming in. Just talk a little about your round and your day and how you're feeling after it.
RICHARD S. JOHNSON: Yeah, I mean we had a great grouping today. Scott Verplank and Johnson Wagner and all three of us were flying through the beginning. So it really helped everybody to just kind of stay loose out there and just make a lot of birdies.
It was a terrific day. The course is playing fairly easy. If this course is ever easy. But they put the pins in some of those like swales and hollows, so you can use the bank to spin it back to the pin. The course is playing great. Not much more to say, really.

Q. What's that like, as you're making the turn around 16, 17, and I think at the time you were probably 3-under or so, you were the last guy in the group.
RICHARD S. JOHNSON: Exactly, that's how it was. I didn't birdie 16, and that was like oh, I need to step it up, here. They were 4, I think both of them. We came to 17 and all three of us -- the wind was kind of swirling there so we all kind of hit it in the middle of the green.
And on 18 I just hit it out to the right and got a flier and hit it in the back bunker and made the bunker shot. So all of a sudden I was the group leader there making the turn.

Q. Where did you hole the bunker shot?
RICHARD S. JOHNSON: On 18, making the turn. And then coming in on 1 I made a nice birdie on 1. And then I got a little greedy on 2, I was going to try to hook it around the corner and caught the edge of the tree and straight into a palmetto bush there and took an unplayable drop on the flag line and hooked it around. I made a really nice bogey in the end. That kind of kept me in the round a lot, so that was nice.

Q. Finish out the hole for us, into the palmetto bush?
RICHARD S. JOHNSON: On 2 I hit it in the palmetto bush, dropped in the flag line on the cart path, got a relief from the cart path. Hooked it around this the fairway, had about 255 to the pin, sliced a 3-wood up on the back edge there and two-putted. It wasn't the routine bogey, but it was nice to get away from there with bogey.

Q. Greens pretty receptive today, overnight rain. It was playing hard and fast earlier in the week, but do they seem more receptive now?
RICHARD S. JOHNSON: Yeah, they're fairly receptive, especially if you land the ball into the green they're very respected. But if you come in down green, they're not going to just plug, but they're as receptive as I've seen them around here for a while, yeah.

Q. Are they slower today than the last couple days or about the same?
RICHARD S. JOHNSON: It's kind of -- we all played well, so we were pretty much on the right side of the pin. If you have downhill, downgrain, they're still very, very fast.

Q. If you don't mind me saying, I watched you guys tee off on 17 and I didn't feel hardly any wind at all. I'm curious how much more wind you feel than the average stiff, which would be me, when you've actually got a club in your hand and a card in your pocket?
RICHARD S. JOHNSON: Yeah, it makes a difference there, because we all stood on that tee box. We had downwind on 16, so we should have had a little into the wind, and it was just a perfect number for a hard 9, really. But Scottie hit a little soft 8 just on top, and I thought, what happened there. And Johnson hit a 9 just on top, so I chipped an 8 up there. But you're still such an uncomfortable tee shot, because if you land it on top, you're catching the downgrain and you might get one skid in the back. It's back and forth there. If you hit it short into the hill you're going to suck it almost straight into the front water. You don't have that much space to land on. I'm not going to say it's easier when it's firm, but it's a tricky hole.

Q. The end result, did you have a slight breeze in your face based on 16?
RICHARD S. JOHNSON: Yeah, I think we had, maybe, but it's so little, it's like three yards, maybe. We all chipped the ball in there, so the ball doesn't stand up so much. Maybe if you hammered something you might climb a little bit. No, I wouldn't say it was much wind at all to talk about.

Q. How early did you figure out that you guys -- there are a lot of red numbers out there, guys really firing today, a little different than years past here. Were you surprised?
RICHARD S. JOHNSON: We all had such a nice start. Like I said, Johnson and Scottie both birdied 14, yeah, 14, so we all were 2, then. We were cruising along, nothing -- it's nice. We're not doing anything spectacular. And then on 15 we come up and Johnson hits it very close. I hit it in there about 15, 20 feet and Scottie holes his second shot for eagle. I make my putt and Johnson makes his putt. So all of a sudden we're 3, 3, 4, and we're like, what's going on here? And we've got 16 to play. Yeah, we just kind of fed off each other the whole day. It was kind of nice. Everybody was making putts and things were going in.

Q. You were a handball champion in Sweden?
RICHARD S. JOHNSON: I wouldn't say a champion. I played handball, yeah, but not the handball you play over here, like an Olympic sport with six players and a goalie. It's a little different. I think you call handball when you hit a smaller ball with your hand. This is a big ball, like a soccer, almost.

Q. You were good?
RICHARD S. JOHNSON: I wouldn't say I was good.

Q. Why is it on the video board?
RICHARD S. JOHNSON: Because they love to make it -- I wouldn't say I'm a champion, no, not at all. I was trying to get to the first division with our team. I was not a champion at all. But you know, they love it.

Q. The reason I ask, they had in lighting up on the video board, and they had that information under Tiger's name. What do you think the fans would think about that?
RICHARD S. JOHNSON: I could see some Swedes -- yeah, absolutely, why the heck not? He can probably jump as high as anybody. He's probably the most athletic guy we have out here. Yeah, I bet he'd be good at anything he did. I don't think it would have matter if he would have started in tennis, golf, skiing, whatever, he would have been as good as anybody.

Q. I'm trying to play longer, you have to jump in this sport?
RICHARD S. JOHNSON: Yeah. You've never seen it, apparently.

Q. Apparently not.
RICHARD S. JOHNSON: No. Yeah, you've got to jump. That's why I quit, because I wasn't that high (laughter). I had a little height disadvantage in this sport. I had to be on the corner.
MARK WILLIAMS: We appreciate you coming in. Good start to the tournament.

End of FastScripts

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