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NATIONWIDE CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL INVITATIONAL

July 30, 2009

Scott Parel

COLUMBUS, OHIO

JOE CHEMYCZ: We welcome Scott Parel in to our interview room. Scott, 4-under 67 today but not the best finish. Despite that, just talk about your play this afternoon. Obviously some very good things out there.
SCOTT PAREL: Yeah, I played pretty solid. I changed putters this week, and that's made a big difference. I had a lot more confidence on the greens today, made quite a few more putts than I've been making here lately.
But I feel like this is a pretty good course for me. I usually drive the ball pretty straight, and with the greens being soft compared to what they normally are, it was kind of out there for the taking today.
JOE CHEMYCZ: But there still isn't much there for the taking.
SCOTT PAREL: I guess with it being wet, it's playing pretty long, so I'm not sure guys are really realizing how much you can kind of attack the pins, even though you're just so used to not being able to do that here, the ball really holding on the greens. I'm sure if we don't get any rain that won't last.
But yeah, the scores are probably not as low as I kind of thought they'd be. We could kind of tell when we got on the first green how soft they were going to be.
JOE CHEMYCZ: Did you have issues with putting the last couple weeks?
SCOTT PAREL: Yeah, my stats haven't been that terrible, but I just -- I've had a lot of putts here lately I've felt like inside eight, ten feet that I just haven't been making, and I've kind of lost confidence and just decided to go to a whole different style of putter to help me; instead of a face-balanced, something that has heel weight, so I'll release the putter a little bit better because I have a tendency to not finish my stroke. It felt very good today.

Q. Is it a different looking head?
SCOTT PAREL: Yeah, completely different looking head, too.

Q. Does that take some getting used to when you're looking down and all of a sudden you see this different shape?
SCOTT PAREL: You know, I thought it would be, but for some reason right when I picked up putter up, and I have not putted with this style putter before in the past, it just really looked good to my eye, and it just feels -- I think the length of the cut and the weight that it is, it just feels so good in my hands that I don't really even notice that it's different. Obviously it is, but I'm not looking down at it thinking, man, that looks a lot different. It just feels so good. It feels very comfortable.

Q. When you said that you didn't -- the scores weren't as low as you might have thought they'd be when you started out, is it just instinctive that when guys might have a 4- or 5-iron in their hand they're not used to going at the pin?
SCOTT PAREL: Yeah, I mean, and a lot of that, too, is past history out here. Even though you tell yourself the green is soft, it's hard to -- you've got a pin that's four from the edge with a 5- or a 6-iron in your hand, you're still thinking, you know, middle of the green, short of the pin is probably the play. But really the way they are today, you could really go pretty much right at it, and if you hit it correctly, you're going to hold it.
And the other reason, too, is our group, Dave was playing well, so sometimes when -- and Mike actually was playing well until the end. You feel like everybody is playing like your group is, so you're not sure if there are guys that are really going low or if we just happened to be paired together and both played really well.

Q. I didn't get a chance to look at the book. How has your year been up to this point?
SCOTT PAREL: I've only made one cut. I've played in seven events so far and have made one cut. I finished, I think, tied for 13th in Greenville. I only got in one event really early in the year, and I've been getting in lately, but I've missed -- I think I've missed five cuts in a row.
But the last couple events I feel like I've played okay, it's just that I haven't gotten anything out of my round. I've missed the cut by a couple of shots in Canada and last week. Shooting 3-under last week was not terrible, but you've got to make birdies to make the cut, and I didn't make enough, and a lot of that was because of my putting.

Q. Bjornstad was just in here and said that he feels like he plays better on tougher courses, and because of what you just said, maybe a tournament where you don't have to go way low is maybe more suited --
SCOTT PAREL: Yeah, I think it's definitely an advantage for somebody like me, and I would think for most guys it would probably be that way. A lot of times out here you don't feel like par is that good a score on our Tour, where at this course you know going in par is a good score on almost every hole out here.
There's not too many holes out here where guys would say, I should make birdie there every day. Maybe a couple of the par-5s you should at least give yourself an opportunity. But the greens are so difficult on those par-5s if you put it in the wrong spot, you're not going to make birdie on the green itself.
It does make a difference for me to know that par is a good score, then maybe you don't press so much if you don't make a bunch -- if you don't make two or three birdies early. You feel like, well, I'm still going to be hanging around if I just make a couple and get back to somewhere around par. You're still going to have a decent chance in this event come Sunday probably.

Q. When you started out today, what did you think might lead?
SCOTT PAREL: You know, like after we -- I guess when we turned, I thought somebody is going to shoot 5- or 6-under at least probably, and somebody may still. The only thing that may be tougher in the afternoon is that because the greens are so soft, they may start to get a little waffly from everybody walking on them, so it may be tougher to hole the putts.
But the greens are rolling perfect. This morning they were just great speed for making it. You didn't think about hitting an uphill putt too hard and you weren't terrified of a downhill putt. They were a good, comfortable speed, I thought, and a lot of it had to do with moisture.

Q. So you got as low as 5?
SCOTT PAREL: Yeah, I birdied 17 and got to 5, yeah.

Q. How did you birdie 17 and then what happened on 18?
SCOTT PAREL: I hit a 3 hybrid, and it was just a really good club for where the hole was, and hit it in there probably five or six feet.
And then 18 I just didn't -- I didn't commit to the line I wanted to hit off the tee I don't think. I got a little too wishy-washy when I stood over the ball. I felt some wind kind of come into me from the left, and my initial thought was to hit a draw off the edge of the bunker, and then I thought, gosh, you don't really want to do that into the wind, if you pull it's going to hit the tree, just all the things you shouldn't think about. I ended up hitting it in the bunker off the tee to the right, and I have kind of a low ball flight. I should have comfortably been able to get it over the lip, but I made sure that I was going to get over, and I kind of hit it a little fat, didn't get up-and-down from about 65 yards.

Q. How far was the putt you missed?
SCOTT PAREL: I didn't hit that good a wedge, probably 25 feet maybe. But I really felt for whatever reason, when I marked that ball, I really felt like I was going to make the putt. I just felt very comfortable; even from that range that I knew I was going to probably give myself a pretty good chance if I could just give myself a reasonable look. I hit a good putt, it just came up a little short.

Q. Do you know how many putts you had today?
SCOTT PAREL: I don't know, but I didn't have many. I didn't have many because I missed probably five or six greens, and I think I got all of them about 18 up-and-down. I did have one three-putt on No. 5 from pretty much an impossible position. It was not your normal three-putt. The pin is down in the front right and you're in the back left corner of the green, it's got two or three humps in it going straight downhill. It was a three-putt, but it wasn't like a really bad three-putt, 30 feet or something.

Q. When the course is playing like this and like you said, you can go at it out there, what are its defenses that still allow it to give up nothing more than 4-under?
SCOTT PAREL: Well, I think probably missing the fairways. The rough is not as high, but if you miss it off the tee, like I did on 18, even if you hit it in the fairway bunker, you've still got -- I think the bunkering out here makes the fairway bunker shots pretty difficult for the most part. And then just the slopes of the greens and where they do put the pins. Like I said, on the par-5s if you miss -- you feel like you should make birdies, and I did birdie them all, but if you put yourself in the wrong position even on the green, it's not a given that -- you've really got to be precise with your shots into the greens, especially on the par-5s. The mounding and the pin placements are pretty much the only defense it's got when it's this soft.

Q. Tough pin positions today?
SCOTT PAREL: I thought they were about normal for the first day out here. They're going to have probably six or seven that are really difficult and six or seven that are semi-difficult and then that many that are going to be -- I wouldn't say necessarily easy, but ones that you shouldn't have too much problem with out of the fairway.
JOE CHEMYCZ: Scott, thank you.

End of FastScripts

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