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PORTUGAL MASTERSOctober 18, 2009Lee WestwoodVILAMOURA, PORTUGAL Q. Four birdies in the first four? LEE WESTWOOD: Yeah, it was a great start. I could easily have birdied 5, I was a bit disappointed but it was a great way to start the day. And from then on, I thought a few of the flags were really tucked away, some sucker flags and I played patient golf after that, the sort of stuff I did ten years ago when I was winning a lot and tried not to press it too hard. And obviously made the most of the two par 5s, pretty good third shot on 17. All I could see was trees and water, and a really tight lie. So that's down to all of the hard work I've been doing with Pete Cowen at home on the chipping green. Q. You're now No. 1 on The Race to Dubai; how does that feel? LEE WESTWOOD: It feels great. It's a while since I've been there, obviously won it back in 2000, but nearly ten years since. And I said a couple of weeks ago that I needed to win a couple of events to have a chance to win the Order of Merit, and I've won one now. And winning is definitely a habit, I just got out of that habit, getting into contention and not finishing it off and hopefully now I'm back in that habit and try and win some more before the end of the year and try to win the Order of Merit. Q. Do you think your fitness is helping a lot? LEE WESTWOOD: Oh, for sure. I'm not getting any younger. I'm 36 years old now. It did occur to me that I had to do something about my fitness and I've been working really starred with Steve MacGregor at home and it's paying off. I feel a lot stronger. Cardio-wise I'm good out there and I feel like I can play again now, and I'm hitting the ball a lot further and I'm driving it good and feel like I have control of my body and delighted with the way it's going. I have a good team down THERE. Q. Massive support. LEE WESTWOOD: It was like playing in England. There were a few people out there from Worksop. It's nice to win on the back of Nottingham Forest's win last night over Newcastle. Q. And you're a local resident. LEE WESTWOOD: Yeah, that's right, I have sponsors here, the Oceânico Victoria sponsor tournaments, as well and it's great for them one of their players winning the event. They do a lot for golf. Without sponsors like the Tourism de Portugal and others putting in good events like this, we would have nothing to play for and it would be pretty dull, wouldn't it for everybody watching. The sponsors are really, really valuable, and we appreciate them more than ever during these kind of financial times. It was nice to finish it off. You always do slightly doubt yourself in the back of your mind and hopefully now I can feed off this and try to roll in a few wins like I did sort of ten years ago. You don't know when the next win is going to come it along, that's the thing. You can keep giving yourself some chances and sometimes when you keep giving yourself so many chances you start to question yourself when you don't finish it off. And until you do finish it off, that question is always in the back of your mind. Q. 17, as you hit the second shot, if you hit the car park, there's water behind, did you think there was a danger -- LEE WESTWOOD: Today I got a couple absolute stinkers of yardages, just horrible yardages. That one there, I wanted to jump all over a 3-iron. It was just off an upslope and got a bit of mud on it and all I could see was water short and I tried to hit a smooth 5-wood and came out like a rocket with no fade on it, dead straight and got a bit fortunate. Didn't get the easiest of drops, still had to play the shot and that's why I've been practising so hard at home on my short game. It paid me dividends around the back nine. Made a good up-and-down at 12. A good up-and-down at 15, good up-and-down at 16 and great up-and-down at 17. That's the sort of thing that you have to do when you're trying to win tournaments. You have to dig it out sometimes. I always take a good look at the World Rankings and it's nice to be up there. Q. Reflection of the way you've played the last two years. LEE WESTWOOD: The reflection and consistency. Q. Was it just a question of the consistency has been there, you've been happy with the strike, it's just that over the finishing line? LEE WESTWOOD: Yeah, just finishing it off and doing the right things at the right times. You know, I've either been too aggressive or too careful on the golf course. I found the greens slow this week, I left a lot short, but my tee-to-green this week was so strong that I can't recall rolling a putt outside of 15, 18 feet. I didn't hole one putt where I thought, that's a bonus. Shows the quality of my tee-to-green game. I was quite pleased to see the wind at start of the day around the front nine. I was happy to see a good bit of wind blowing. End of FastScripts |
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