U.S. SENIOR OPEN CHAMPIONSHIP

June 30, 2000

Hale Irwin

HALE IRWIN: As I made a comment earlier, even yesterday that -- that I was feeling a little bit like I was skating on thin ice out there yesterday, and today I heard the ice cracking. It was a pretty ugly round. I didn't hit the ball well at all. And for me to really get back into where I feel like I can go out there and muster up the kind of golf that I am capable of playing, I am going to have to hit the ball better. I was hitting it well a couple of days ago, but just sort of lost the timing a bit. The golf course was a much different golf course than we saw yesterday. Some hole locations that were a little bit more vengeful than yesterday. The course was very receptive to lower scoring yesterday than it was today. So I think we are just seeing a little bit of the field will come back closer to what the expected scores might have been, with the exception of Bruce who has played two very nice rounds. I think the rest of the field is playing about the way you might anticipate them playing. But my game, it is a little loose right now. I am going to go give it a little thought over lunch, what I need to do, and go down and hit a few balls, then kind of give it a rest.

HALE IRWIN: I told my caddie today, I said: "My back doesn't hurt at all today because I am swinging so lousy." It is when I swing well when it hurts. It was hurting the first of the week. It is not now. That is the truth. Because I did strain it at Atlanta where I won, and I have been hitting the ball well. It has been hurting. But it hasn't hurt too badly today. In fact, I hardly noticed it today. I think some of it is the fact that I might be subconsciously just not giving it the hit that I might ordinarily, and I don't know -- I don't want to go down and make it hurt. I am going to try to sort it through in my mind before I go hit a whole lot of golf balls.

HALE IRWIN: Absolutely. I feel terrific in the position that I find myself now. I went out, I birdied -- bogeyed the 2nd hole and the 4th hole, so was 2-over. I had to make a really nice putt at 5 for a par. So I could have been over par and lost it very early, very quickly. But I kind of kept hanging in there, hacking it around. I birdied 10 and 17 to finish at even par, so I am not at all unhappy with my position. I can see Bruce and he can see me, and there will be a few other players in between, but that is fine. We still got two very important rounds to go, and he is playing well. Maybe the experience factor that I have had will help eat up some of that difference.

HALE IRWIN: Well, no. The ball was laying up against that heavy grass, and I told my caddie, I said: If I play for this to come (inaudible) -- the thing of the grass would catch that hosel, I said: If I aim it to the right, then it doesn't, then I have missed the green way to the right with a pin on the right. I don't want to do that. I just tried to aim it at the flag, let it kind of get to the center of the green. It just pulled that club dead. It was only a 6-iron, so it wasn't -- looked like -- well, it was a terrible shot, but it wasn't anything you can control. No drag on the toe of the club. It was all in the heel part of the club. So it just turned that club over big time.

HALE IRWIN: Yes. That is an unequivocal yes. Both. I think -- both. Probably more to putt to, but as I say that there -- with all the ridges in the greens, and the greens are very soft now, so where yesterday you might be able to land it short of one of those ridges or up on top and roll it down. Now if you don't land it in the right spot, it spins back down. So even though they are a little softer, I don't necessarily think they are easier to hit to just simply because there is too many of these rolls and if you hit the face of it yesterday you might still pop up. Today it is just spinning right back. Again I go back -- I am not striking the ball quite the way I want, so I couldn't really tell you real accurately if they were tough or not. I thought every shot out there was tough today. I was just fighting it.