U.S. OPEN CHAMPIONSHIP

June 17, 1994

Hale Irwin

Q. The way you closed out the front, you said you went to lunch. Is there anyway to explain how it could change that quickly; you start with a double bogey and then bogey a couple of more?

HALE IRWIN: Well, I think-- what I can only surmise, not necessarily when trying to do this, but, I think, the eagle push was very nice. I was feeling very good about that. But I had got up on the tee; I sort of lost my concentration a little bit. I was still reveling on how I played the hole before. There was a bit of noise behind me. I kind of lost my concentration; didn't hit a good 3-wood. I didn't hit it so bad that I deserved the lie that I got in the rough. It was a very bad lie. I just couldn't get it anywhere but 50 yards down the fairway. Then I thought I played a half way decent third, but it didn't roll six feet. Then I really am in trouble, because you are playing that shot to roll on down. When it doesn't, you are doing good to get out in two. Really there was only one bad shot on the hole. But I did make a 6 out of it so-- but it was a very sobering six; kind of got me thinking you got to get back in it now and I did play the next hole this way. I didn't play 12 badly. I really only had a couple of bad shots there in. The roll I had going was terminally stopped by that double bogey. It was just a matter then sort of picking it back up. I knew I was still in the tournament; still had a good chance to have a good score and had someone giving me that score start of the day without going through the exorcism of 4 under, 2 over, I would have taken it.

Q. Do you know how many fairways and greens you hit?

HALE IRWIN: Well, for the front 9, I hit every fairway, and missed three greens, but now we get to start on that. Missed the 10th. I did-well, I missed 10, I missed the green, miss fairway; miss green. 11, I hit, hit 12. I hit and hit 13. I hit -- 14 I missed and missed. 15 I hit and hit. 16, I missed. 17, I hit. 18, I hit. Whatever that ended up being. I didn't count. I think probably I missed 1, 2, 3 fairways.

Q. How do you deal with the emotional roller-coaster; the double at 10; almost knocked it in the hole at 13; struggle at 14; do you feel yourself up and down emotionally?

HALE IRWIN: I think there is only every chance to get that way, but I try to go back to the thought that pars are good scores on any hole on this golf course. And if you take the two holes, put them together, I have got two pars. Sort of a simple way of doing it, but I am pretty simple minded. I think if you let yourself get carried away with -- particularly the extreme bad, if you get in a double bogey -- for instance, Fred Couples today had some stretch of three or four holes with just really playing very poorly. I think it kind of got away from him, although, he has capacity to come back with a lot of birdies. That makes a very difficult comeback. I try to put it behind me and try and play the next hole as intelligently and aggressively as I feel that I can. And hopefully, the good will come from it. I did some good shots out there..

Q. Tom said today that the course played softer but the greens were faster. Do you agree with that?

HALE IRWIN: Well, it definitely was softer. I thought that was the most difficult part of the golf course today, not so much that the greens were faster, but it was softer in that you could play the balls into the greens more. Played the course for four days; playing a long, long roll and suddenly to get yourself to hit another club to get it back there was quite difficult to do. But I didn't think the putting was that much more treacherous but then again, today, I think I left the ball under the hole more than I did yesterday. I had some ticklish ones down the hill yesterday, and the ones I had today, I pretty much left it uphill where I wanted to.

Q. Hale, back to the roller-coaster thing. Did the '84 Open at Winged Foot, that finish there, did that kind of reshape your philosophy about the Open? Did it have any impact on the way you look at things in the Open?

HALE IRWIN: Well, '84 Open was a little different than some of the others. I had just the nostalgia coming back from Winged Foot from the '74 Open to '84 getting into the lead with the final day, and I put some personal problems that my father was ill at the time, I kind of put that ahead of myself. I just got myself on emotional roller-coaster way out there trying to do some things that were not conducive to good golf. I don't think it reshaped anything as much -- it may have, I suppose, but I think it led me to the thought that no matter what is going on off the golf course, you can't let it carry onto the golf course. And any of us that have any sort of personal problems, you find that hard to do. But I had just created sort of a monster for myself. I was not playing all that well, but I fought into a lead on Saturday, just a lot of things. It would be fun to come back and win the Open again, and Winged Foot ten years later, the whole romance thing - kind of silly right now. But it was fun.

Q. You said that the course is softening up. Will that let a lot more guys into the field, and is that a disadvantage to you?

HALE IRWIN: I think it will. Certainly, this afternoon, it will let them in. Because yesterday afternoon it got pretty firm out there. I think what affected us as much as anything yesterday was the pace of play. It was so slow. Whether that will be the case today, I don't know, but there are a number of shots -- similar shots today on the holes that we had yesterday and the ball was checking up much more quickly than it did yesterday, and I sense that that would be the case all afternoon. I didn't see the greens sort of baking out starting to get that little bit of a firm base to them and that sheen that they get when they get fast. I don't think that will happen today, so it could let a few more guys in.

Q. How did you react to the heat today, and what is your position on the rule about no shorts?

HALE IRWIN: I thought it was hotter yesterday. Maybe because we had to wait much more yesterday, it seemed hotter. The no shorts thing, well, some of those guys' legs I wouldn't want to see. But it would be nice to wear something a little bit cooler.

LES UNGER: Just to answer a previous statistical question from Unysis info, he hit 9 fairways, and 11 greens, and had 28 putts.

Q. What is the primary reason that you are so good at U.S. Opens?

HALE IRWIN: I don't know. How is that for an answer? Well, let us put it this way, I don't feel when we come to an Open that I have to change my game appreciably to play these conditions. My game is not -- I don't hit the ball with thunderous power. I don't seem to get myself in a whole lot of compromising positions on the golf course to where my score is going to be materially affected if I go this way or that way. I think I have a lot of patience in the U.S. Open. And you have to have a lot of patience, but I think the advantage that I may have coupled with the patience thing is that I do not have to challenge my game a lot. In other words, I don't have to step on it to hit a 5 or I don't have to suddenly take the driver out of my hand and start hitting a lot of 2-irons and fairway woods and get out of that mental sync that some guys get in by grabbing the driver each time and hitting and driving and hitting and now you kind of have to think your way around here; that has always been my forte.

Q. You are playing really well all year, not just for this Open. A lot of other players have won majors and say it is tough for them to stay interested in anything else, but a major, it doesn't seem as if you have that mindset and if you don't, can you explain why? And also, have you given any thought as to how much fun it might be to win the Open for the second time?

HALE IRWIN: Well, the fact that some may say that they only get excited over majors, I have some agreement with that, however, when you are playing well, as I have been this year, you get pretty excited to play any week. You feel like -- I guess what it is to get into contention. Sometimes it may be that the less competitive that you become, the less fun it maybe until you get in that competitive arena. Tom mentioned yesterday that his game is not conducive to two and four under par now. Well, that may well be; hence, why he is a factor this week, because two and four under is not going to be anyway near that. So you can get excited then; you don't feel like you have to go birdie every hole. I think it is a little more than that. I think that in my case, I have had some goals that I am trying to achieve. I got started on a good note with some fundamental changes, not in my swing, but just in a fundamental approach in how I wanted to play the game. Some new equipment. The whole year started off on an exciting note and I got off to a successful start. Each year, each week sort of has been -- I'm just keeping the ball rolling, trying to do what I can in these twilight years while I can.

Q. The fact that you won when you were a special exemption in 1990, did that kind of restart your entire career?

HALE IRWIN: I think it would be foolish to say that it didn't have some bearing. Absolutely. The exemption that the USGA gave me was -- you can never properly thank them; particularly when you go out and win, you have a chance -- but I was ready to qualify anyway. I would have done that anyway whether I made it or not. I don't know. The exemptions are nice to have, but who is to say who is more deserving than the other.

Q. Did it turn things around for you winning that tournament?

HALE IRWIN: Yeah. Any time you win an Open, it can really turn things around, quickly, but it wasn't as if I wasn't field competitive. I think as the results that made the turnaround look more impressive than it really was, I felt in my own mind that I made the made the turnaround; if I didn't win that week, well then I would win it the next week. I felt like I was playing very well. But certainly, winning the Open on an exemption has a special significance.

Q. How about talking about important winnings. How about Hilton Head situation. What did that do for your psyche confidence for the rest of this year?

HALE IRWIN: Well, I was stuck on 19 wins for a few years. I kind of wanted to get over the hump. 19 is just a bad number. I wanted 20. I think winning at Harbour Town, a course that I won my first two tournaments, had special significance because it was a course that I have tended to play well, that kind of a golf course through the years. I have not been one of these players that have gone on to play the big Open kind of -- not U.S. Open, but the wide Open kind of courses very well. But given the conditions under which we play at Harbour Town; very narrow fairways; very small greens; tends to bring out my game. I tend to get better focused, and when that is the case, then I think I am more competitive. But coming back with any win, but particularly there, I think was -- I felt very good about that because Harbour Town, even though we shoot low scores there, it is still not an easy golf course versus, let us say, a course where we -- where it is -- well, Greensboro. It is a nice golf course, but it is a much bigger course. I tend not to play as well there than I do at a Harbour Town kind of course. The renewal of that confidence factor was absolutely -- it was there, no doubt that it; had a special significance in what I have done thus far.

LES UNGER: Okay.

HALE IRWIN: Thank you, ladies and gentlemen.

End of FastScripts....