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WGC ACCENTURE MATCH PLAY CHAMPIONSHIP

February 17, 2010

Geoff Ogilvy

MARANA, ARIZONA

COLIN MURRAY: Geoff, thanks for joining us. Looks like you picked up right where you left off last year, a 7 and 5 victory this morning. Just talk about the start you got off today and where you go from here.
GEOFF OGILVY: Obviously a really good result. You can't win the tournament if you don't win on the first round. So it's nice to get off to a good start. It was kind of a weird match at first. We traded holes, I don't think we halved a hole for a whole match. I don't know if I've been involved in a match where there's no halved holes. We traded holes for the first five or six, seven holes, maybe. And Alex missed a couple of putts for me, and then I putted a couple of good holes, and all of a sudden I was 4-up and I started playing really, really well, and by the end hitting some pretty good shots and making a few nice shots.
An odd match to start, we gifted each other a couple of holes, and then I start playing really, really solid and Alex didn't play like he can. So a bit of both contributed to the big result. But it's nice -- 13 is a really nice green to finish on, because before you go back away again, it's quite close.
Last year I had a chance in the final to finish there, but I ended up going all the way to 15 or 16. It was nice. You want to win the match. And maybe the first time in the first round I ever won the match before the 19th hole, so it's pretty good.

Q. In the first round I know that you guys don't play this format a lot. How long does it take for you to start feeling it a little bit and getting in the groove?
GEOFF OGILVY: I don't know, I guess we played match play not that long ago, at Presidents Cup. I think the guys who were there maybe it's easy to get in the zone. Perhaps if you went a couple of years in this tournament, and you're out in the first round, you might have only played two match play matches in three or four years for some of these guys, it's might be kind of hard. But it's quite quick to get in the match play mode.
You definitely improve as the week goes on. Every time I've gone deep in the week, I've felt more and more match play fit, if you like, every day. So it takes you a few holes, but, I mean, not too long. I think having that Presidents Cup later last year really helps the guys who are there, because that's stress from the first tee, you know? And that's quite recent. A few holes you get right into it. But then all of a sudden, on the second or third hole you have all that must up-and-down and that must make putt, and you're straight back in your match play head.

Q. It must feel strange not having to sweat on the first day?
GEOFF OGILVY: It is. As I said, I've never had a first round like that in this tournament. It was -- I've been down the 9th first hole again very regularly in this tournament, as I said, in the first round. Very nice to get 1-under belt. It was nice to -- there was a couple of funky shots early, but the last seven or eight holes I played, I didn't miss a beat. I hit some really good shots and I was really, really happy with the way I was playing at the end. It's a good result match-wise and it's a good result, I felt, because of the way I was playing at the end of it.

Q. Sometimes it's good to have a tough match early to put you under the gun, but no complaints about having an easy day?
GEOFF OGILVY: No, either way is good. Winning, all you want to do it win. As I said I've never actually finished -- had a result this big in this tournament. So it's a different feeling than my normal stressful way to stay at this tournament. But as I said yesterday, you get a lot out of those stressful finishes, and those late finishes in these matches. So you go out of a big win with a lot of confidence because you've just had a big win, but you also come out of those tight, close ones, 18, 19, 20th holes with a lot of confidence because you've got to done when you need to. So there's positive to either result, I think.

Q. Based on your previous success here and your success this morning, do you allow yourself or take into these matches that you're the favorite for this event? Is that something that you consider or is that the mindset you have or is it just one match at a time?
GEOFF OGILVY: Just one match at a time, really. Every single day -- almost every single time every I've ever played this tournament I've walked on to the first tee and thought this guy is a good player, I'm going to have to play well to win this match. Not really.
It's such a long week, you've got to win six times to actually win the tournament. I feel like I'm a good match player and I feel like if I get going and I'm playing well enough with a guy who's playing similarly, I feel like I've really got a really good chance to win some of these matches. But I also feel like if someone comes out and -- if someone came out and played really, really well today, it could have gone really deep. It could have gone really late in the match. It's a tournament where I just try to win every day. I really stand on the first tee every day and think I'm going to have to try to play really well to beat this guy, and play really well, and go to bed and wake up and do it again.

Q. There was a lot of talk last year about the shaping of the greens and they closed the course in April and reshaped some of them, did you notice?
GEOFF OGILVY: I think I noticed. I think maybe we played -- I played a lot of rounds around here last year. Some of them are unnoticeable. I've got the book and everything where they told us what they did. But if you didn't look at that you'd struggle to see it in a lot of places, which is actually testament about the quality of work, because usually when they change stuff like that it's fairly obvious that they've done it, which here it's not. The people who were doing it should be proud of themselves, because it's seamless.
There's a few extra pin positions. The greens are maybe a foot or two faster than they were this time last year. There's a few more options with the pins. But I don't think -- if Jack was potentially disappointed with our criticism last year and didn't want it to be changed I don't think he'd be too disappointed. I think the spirit of the original greens is still there. I don't think they've changed too much. I just think they've been perhaps softened in a couple of spots where they were maybe a bit extreme. As I said, maybe if you'd played the first round last year and got out the first round and gone home and come here you wouldn't know they did anything. So it's been a really well-executed change.
COLIN MURRAY: Geoff, thanks for joining us and good luck tomorrow morning.

End of FastScripts

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