	products recent interviews FastScripts archive about ASAP Sports

Our Clients:

Browse by Sport

Find us on

Subscribe to RSS

Click to go to
Asaptext.com

View our
e-Brochure

COMMERCIALBANK QATAR MASTERS PRESENTED BY DOLPHIN ENERGY

January 29, 2010

Brett Rumford

DOHA, QATAR

SCOTT CROCKETT: Brett, thank you, as always, for coming in and joining us and congratulations on a pretty successful day, a pretty successful couple of days out there. Your thoughts on being in the lead at this stage.
BRETT RUMFORD: I haven't really thought about it at all, being in the lead. I was just trying to do my own thing out there today. I didn't look at any scoreboard. I just was trying to do my own thing, and played nicely. I made some nice up-and-downs. The front nine was sort of key.
Got off to a nice start on the first, which is my 10th hole. Then sort of just kept the momentum running. I holed some nice putts, chipped in on 9 from just around the fringe, about 12-foot away. Turned 5-under and made a great up-and-down on 10, missed it left of the green, over in the waste land and hit it to about five feet and made birdie there.
Then played fairly steady coming home. I had some good opportunities but just didn't hole the putts. Hit a nice wedge shot to about a foot on the 18th, which was the 9th, to finish off the round.
So more than pleased and obviously being two shots in the lead at the moment I think, even better.
SCOTT CROCKETT: What was your one dropped shot at the fifth, what happened there?
BRETT RUMFORD: I hit it just a little bit too far rough into the rough, tough drive hole, you can't actually see the fairway, but just drew a really bad lie. Got it up around the green but wasn't able to get up-and-down. So that was my only bogey. But apart from that, it was a steady day.
SCOTT CROCKETT: Anything in particular please you about the game? Seemed to be pretty solid throughout. Anything particularly good?
BRETT RUMFORD: Yeah, my driving has been pretty good this week. Generally when I drive it well, I pretty much play well. My driving was fairly consistent. Obviously the rough being very, very thick this year. It's probably the thickest I've seen it. It's very, very difficult, and the key to this golf course, particularly with these tight pins is getting the ball into play, and I did that today.
The weekend, depending how they tuck the pins, I saw some yellow dots for tomorrow. There are some accessible pins and again; there are going to be some difficult pins. So depending what the wind does, it should be a good day.

Q. Are you surprised that more people weren't able to score low?
BRETT RUMFORD: It's still very difficult. You still have to hit the golf shots. The greens are a little bit grainy this year because of the length of them being a bit longer to do with the wind. It's very, very tough and the pins are tucked.
As I say, if you're just missing the fairway just slightly, it makes it very, very difficult and there's a lot of fairways out there that are slightly diagonally at you.
So you have to shape the ball a lot off the tees and make sure the ball is on the fairway, and from there, you've got a chance of obviously controlling your ball flight. But still you have to hit the right shots on these greens. You have to be very pinpoint, because they are releasing anywhere from sort of eight to 15 metres depending on the lie that you've got.
When you've tucked pins and wind, it's very, very difficult and putting on grain, as well, you don't always get rewarded for hitting it six feet on this particular surface.

Q. Do you enjoy playing in windy conditions --
BRETT RUMFORD: Yeah, I think so. I think it actually forces you into hitting certain golf shots and makes you feel more so, a particular golf shot. And I think you go a whole lot easier on yourself in the wind.
When it was as windy as yesterday, hitting it to 30, 40 feet, you don't beat yourself up so much, whereas when it's come and you're not making the runs of birdies and going under like you think you always should, you get frustrated and you get tired and you start to go backwards sometimes.
But I think in the wind, everyone's expectations lower, and for me, I'm able to stay more patient in those conditions. Rather than the other way around.

Q. Can you compare your two rounds?
BRETT RUMFORD: I think definitely yesterday race round was probably comparable to a 6- or 7-under, myself, in those conditions. I think it was evident with the scoring; it was very, very difficult. And being the last group out, the greens, they do happen to grow around here and they get quite flakey and they get torn up, as well.
So putting can become very difficult. So stayed very, very patient out there yesterday, as I did today, and yesterday was all about just getting it around the golf course. You just had to try and manufacture golf shot and just hit a variety of golf shots that you wouldn't usually hit.
That's what yesterday was all about, and today in calmer conditions, it's all about just playing, you know, hitting the shot that was required. I'm happy with my round of golf. I happened to do that today and stayed patient with it as well.

Q. With the European Tour season ending in November, is it beneficial for your game to be able to play the Australasian Tour events in December?
BRETT RUMFORD: Well, it's fantastic to be able to play in Australia, for one, to go back and play, and it's brilliant that we still have the strength of players coming back to play. I think this year we had perhaps apart from Robert Allenby, some of the strongest Australian players in the field.
So it was fantastic to play in Australia. The break over Christmas is not that much, because we actually play quite a lot up until that point. So I think I've only had four weeks off. So it's not that much of a break coming into this Middle East swing. But our main break comes through April before I head back into Europe.
It's just that perfect amount of time, six weeks, you start to get a bit too rusty and it's difficult just to come back and keep that momentum going. I think four weeks, as I said, maybe have a couple weeks off and you keep it fresh and you get back into it for the next couple of weeks leading into these tournaments.

Q. Do you have a figure in mind for the weekend or does it depend on conditons?
BRETT RUMFORD: Absolutely. Depending on pin placements, depending on how the conditions are on Saturday and Sunday; so the only reason I had the score in mind, I'm not setting a benchmark to try and reach. I just want to try and go out there and make as many birdies as I can.
But obviously if it doesn't happen, then just stay as patient as I can, because I know this golf course can be on the flipside of playing well, and on the flipside, making birdies can be quite trying.

Q. Are you going to try to play in the States again?
BRETT RUMFORD: My goal is the World Ranking points at the moment, get my ranking up higher. And definitely, that was almost always my plan to play America, to go across there for the first year.
Looking back on it, I would have actually gone back to the Qualifying School and given it another crack. I think the first year over there for myself, never playing there, was pretty tough goal to try and maintain a Tour card. I thought would I excel. A few players have are done that but very difficult.

Q. Do you feel there is a Major champion inside you wanting to get out?
BRETT RUMFORD: Myself? Yeah, absolutely. That's why I play the game. Definitely it a goal I'm heading towards, and thanks for bringing that up.

Q. Thoughts on Doha Golf Club?
BRETT RUMFORD: Well, it's a beautiful golf course. When it's setup in these conditions this week, it's a very, very tough golf course. And the condition of it is second to none. It's comparable to the best courses we play all year.
And that's what's so great about playing these three tournaments in the Middle East, how good these golf course are, and what you see on TV, it reflects how it plays. It's very lush and green, and perfect lies, perfect greens; and obviously just a little bit of grain this week, it's a little bit different to what we usually put on being poa mainly. So as I said, a lot of the guys may struggle and that's perhaps why the scoring is just a little bit lower than usual. Putting can be very difficult on these surfaces.
But the golf courses, as I say, they are amazing and a lot of fun to play. Obviously the weather being 25 to 28 degrees, it's ideal playing conditions. There's no wonder why a lot of the top European players come out for these three tournaments.

Q. When you are playing well, is it even harder to watch a good friend like Marcus Fraser in your group struggling?
BRETT RUMFORD: Yeah, there's no doubt about it. He played well yesterday, but just wasn't holing the putts. This golf course when you're not holing putts, you've just missed a few fairways here and there, and then all of a sudden, it's hard to get out of the rough and you miss another green; you're making, really, really soft bogeys and that's what happened to Marcus out there today. His patience level just grew thin, and that's what this golf course can do at times. But he's a great player. He played -- he didn't play that well but this golf course can beat you up.
SCOTT CROCKETT: Brett, thanks very much for that. Good luck tomorrow.

End of FastScripts

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297