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THE 3 IRISH OPENMay 14, 2009Paul LawrieBALTRAY, IRELAND MICHAEL GIBBONS: Give us your assessment of that fine 66. PAUL LAWRIE: I played very well. It's pretty much how I've been playing for a while. I was level par through the first eight and could have easily been sort of 3- or 4-under and then knocked a few nice 15-, 20-footers in about the turn, which kind of got me going. And I think 6-under was about right. I hit the ball very well. I hit a lot of greens. The wind kind of died a wee bit I think, as we were going around it, was a wee bit windy at the start. But I kind of feel, I've always felt very comfortable playing that type of golf on that type of golf course. I enjoy it. And pleased to be 6-under, obviously. Q. Links golf is you, isn't it, so when you turn up here, you have nothing to fear like some of the players have. PAUL LAWRIE: Well, I was brought up playing Aberdeen, and all of the good links courses in my area, and I have no problem hitting a 5-iron 130 yards. It's no problem at all, I quite enjoy it. Same thing, I don't mind hitting a 240-yard 5-iron, wind howling down gale; you get used to it. I played it week-in, week-out when I was young. A pity we don't play it more on Tour. I always felt comfortable on links. Always prefer links course, always have done. Q. How strong was the wind when you talk about the 5-iron variation there? PAUL LAWRIE: The wind was certainly less today than it was the last two days I played. I played nine holes on Tuesday and it was extremely strong. And the Pro-Am yesterday was tough. 11 in the Pro-Am I hit driver, 3-wood in the green-side bunker and I hit 5-iron on the green today, same shot and same sort of line off the tee. It was a lot easier today than it was yesterday but the golf course is still good enough that you are going to have to play good enough to shoot a score. Q. What were the greens like, today? Slow? PAUL LAWRIE: Greens were extremely good out there. Fun to pitch to. You had trouble finding your pitchmark most of the holes, which is a fantastic thing to have to do. It means the greens are nice and firm, and they rolled very well. Q. You were having some troubles over the months and years with the putting, you seem to have sorted it out now, haven't you? PAUL LAWRIE: I feel, I keep telling you boys how well I'm playing, and how poorly I'm putting, but the last week, I putted a lot better. I've been doing a bit of work with Adam again on my putting and my short game for a while, and it's slowly starting to sort of sink in again. It takes a while when you putt the way I've been putting, it doesn't just kind of get better overnight, and I've been working very hard, and I do a bit of putting in my room at night, which I've never really done before. All the time I've been on Tour, I've been putting quite a bit in my room, so all of a sudden I feel as though I've got a chance with the putter again. Q. Did you change you putting? PAUL LAWRIE: We just kind of stuck to the same thing and maybe started doing it a bit more, started practicing a bit more and sitting in the room at night, I kind watch a bit of telly, watch a DVD and hit a few putts. It's getting better. Q. Are you a bit gobsmacked that the text messages become a banned player? PAUL LAWRIE: I think it's extremely unfortunate what's happened. And when I got the letter, when the letter arrived, asking me not to come back, it was just one of those things. I assumed it was a wind-up. And I actually texted the green keeper back to say: Great wind up with the letter you sent, because it had the proper logos and stuff on it. I assumed it was just one of these things that someone sends. But unfortunately it wasn't. I obviously didn't want that situation to arise. It's not something that you go out looking for. The conversation that I had with the green keeper in the shop was about 20 seconds. I asked him what was happening with the greens and he said: "What do you mean?" And I said: "They are pretty bumpy, the ball is jumping about all over the place," and he obviously took it the wrong way. I went back to the house and the guy that I texted message to, I've known him a long time and he texted me back with a bit of banter of his own to my text. So when the letter arrived through the post, I was absolutely gobsmacked. Had they called me to say: We have taken what you said, totally the wrong way, what's the situation, I would have said, sorry about that, that's not what it was meant and it would never have came to what it's came to. So they wrote me a letter asking me never to return. Unfortunate that these things happen. You get on with it. It's not going to bother me one little bit as you can see today. It's not going to harm my career by one shot, so I don't have a problem with that at all. Q. ? PAUL LAWRIE: I've had an unbelievable amount of texts from obviously people that help us with the foundation that are members out there. You know, it's the golf club in the area that you want to be a member of. It is a beautiful place and it's a great place to practice. I know an awful lot of the members that are members there, and most of them have texted me or left a message with support saying how poorly you've been treated and how we are all angry. Like I said, very unfortunate. Q. ? PAUL LAWRIE: Neil Marr, who is my coach, he has been coaching some of our team there. It's not a base for my foundation. We don't really have a base. We go all over the place. End of FastScripts |
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