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U.S. WOMEN'S OPEN CHAMPIONSHIPJuly 19, 2000Grace ParkLIBERTYVILLE, ILLINOIS RHONDA GLENN: I'm sure you'll all recall this from last year that Grace Park played in the Women's Open as an amateur. She tied for 8th and she broke the Amateur scoring record in a Women's Open with a score of 283, 5-under par, and she's gone on to a great professional career. How do you feel about your game this week? Are you ready to win the Women's Open? GRACE PARK: Well, first of all, I feel good about my game, but then we'll see how much challenge the course gives me. But I want to, that's for sure. RHONDA GLENN: How does the golf course fit your game or not fit your game? GRACE PARK: Well, I mean, I want to say it fits my game, I like the course, I'm going to play well, but I -- but I know that I want to keep my ball in the fairway and on the green, not outside in the rough, for sure. Q. Are you feeling any better this week? I know you withdrew from the tournament last week? GRACE PARK: Yeah, I was pretty ill. But I got to come out here earlier. I came out early, just rested, practiced a little bit and I'm definitely better. Feel a little weak, but I'll be fine. Q. What was wrong? GRACE PARK: I don't know. (Laughter.) Q. How have you felt your professional career has progressed, as successful as you would hope? GRACE PARK: I have a win now, so nothing can be better than having a win under my belt. But there was a little bit of a struggle in the beginning of the season when I was not playing well and just stressing a lot over my ball-striking, just nothing seemed to get -- be quite the way I liked. But ever since, everything has been a smooth ride. RHONDA GLENN: Grace, you took an unusual route to the LPGA TOUR playing on the FUTURES Tour, and I believe you finished as leading money winner there and that got you exempt on the LPGA TOUR. Was that a difficult thing to go through? Did it worry you that maybe you would not get the LPGA TOUR slot or that maybe you would not be successful in that venture? GRACE PARK: Actually, I was going for Top-10, which would have given me an exemption through the first stage of the qualifying school, but after playing a few events and a couple wins, I knew that I had a chance to go for the Top 3 and fortunately, I played very well, you know, shot 14-under, 16-under for three-day events, and won a few more events and got the Player of the Year on the TOUR and got myself an exemption here on the TOUR, LPGA TOUR. Q. Grace, you are one of the longer hitters out here. How does this course set up for you, and are you expecting to hit driver on some of the holes? GRACE PARK: I think it's half and half. I do hit enough drivers, but I don't hit it on every hole. There are some holes I hit 3-wood off the tee, but, you know, I don't think it's that narrow. I mean, it's a wide enough fairway. Q. Do you think it's wider than last year, and does it set up for your game? GRACE PARK: I don't remember. I know that the rough is definitely tougher and thicker and longer than last year. But, sure, I mean whatever the course conditions, I'm going to play through it. Q. I know you went through a stretch, I think you had about 10 weeks in a row that you were playing. Being a rookie, how tough was it to go through that stretch? GRACE PARK: Very, very tough. I wasn't planning on going to go play 10 straight. It was going to be five, and then a week off, but then I decided to go seven, because I felt like my game was coming around and I was starting to play better and I didn't want to quit on the seventh week off and start from the bottom again. I won my seventh week, which got me to Evian in France, and I couldn't refuse that. So, I had to go there and then a couple more after that. But it was a great experience, but something I'll never, ever do again. (Laughs). Q. I saw you earlier in Austin this year, is there something specific in your game that's changed or improved? GRACE PARK: I used to say long game was my strength, but in the beginning, that was my worst struggle, I guess. I wasn't hitting it anywhere, couldn't hit it straight, couldn't hit the fairway, couldn't hit the greens. And you know, when you don't, the best you can do is par, and that's not good enough out here, and that's where I was hitting a lot of shots to. Q. You've always been confident; did you think it was going to be easier when you turned pro than it has been so far? GRACE PARK: I didn't think it was going to be easy, but I didn't think it was going to be that tough. I was struggling so much that I was starting to, you know, get a little -- I don't know, it was just a struggle. But rookie time I was serving. Q. You grew up with a lot of the American players. Do you have an explanation why there isn't more success from American players? GRACE PARK: No. There are a lot of great players. Q. Your bio says you enjoy shopping and listening to music, what kind of music? GRACE PARK: Korean. Q. Have you been to the mall this week? GRACE PARK: Shopped too much at last week's tournament, New York. End of FastScripts.... |
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