U.S. SENIOR OPEN CHAMPIONSHIP

July 31, 2004

Peter Jacobsen

Q. Could you start us off with birdies and bogeys?

PETER JACOBSEN: Sure. Birdies and bogeys, started on 10 -- birdied 11, No. 11, I hit a 3-wood and a sand wedge to about three feet, birdied there.

No. 13, I missed the green just left and had a chip of probably 40 feet, and it ran in the hole. It was a great little bonus there.

I bogeyed No. 16, the very difficult downhill par 3. I hit a 3-iron just short, landed it above the bunker, and it came back and blasted out to 20 feet and two-putted.

I birdied 18, hit it just in the left rough and hit an 8-iron, and it rolled up to about three feet, tapped that in.

3, I almost had a hole in one, but I missed it from about four feet.

I three-putted No. 4. I hit a drive in the fairway, 3-wood just short of the green, chipped it about 15 feet, and I three-putted, missed about a two-footer.

Then I bogeyed the next hole, driver and 8-iron, just left and long, terrible chip down the hill and two-putted for bogey.

Then I birdied No. 6, had a 5-iron to about 15 feet and made that, and then I parred in.

Q. It seemed as though when you did get that birdie on 6 it settled you right down.

PETER JACOBSEN: Yeah, it was getting hot out there. It's funny, I had some -- the pins I thought today were really tough. They had them on a lot of greens, like No. 7 and No. 8 especially, those two coming in were very difficult pin positions. I missed a shortie at 3, three-putted 4 and bogeyed 5. Any time you come back with a birdie on 6, that's going to settle you down.

Q. You missed that hole in one by like that (indicating).

PETER JACOBSEN: You can't see the flag from the bottom tee, but when it landed, everybody put their arms up which means hole in one, and then they went like that.

Q. How much discomfort are you in? I saw you stretching out there.

PETER JACOBSEN: It's just stiffness. It's stiffness -- it's hard to explain. I really don't know how to explain it other than the fact that I've been stretching -- the surgery, the trauma of the surgery, the doctor told me that everything is just going to be tight, and I just have to stretch through the pain and stretch through the stiffness, and during the day today, probably from about the third hole on, I felt some tightening, so I just have to stretch it out every hole as much as I can.

Q. I guess it was a pretty big benefit for you to have yesterday off?

PETER JACOBSEN: It was a huge benefit. I'm going to catch it on the back end. Tomorrow is going to be real interesting. I came into this week withdrawing from the last two tournaments because I couldn't walk 18, and I'm elated to have walked two days 18, and now we get 36 tomorrow. That's like, boy, be careful what you wish for. I just want to walk golf. Okay, do 36. Oh, okay (laughter).

Q. When you start feeling that stiffness, how much does it get in the back of your head when you're trying to play well?

PETER JACOBSEN: It doesn't get in my head because I've been practicing and hitting shots. Hitting shots isn't a problem, but it's getting from one spot to another.

Q. (Inaudible).

PETER JACOBSEN: I probably wouldn't take a cart. I'd probably still walk. If it's 36 tomorrow, I'd probably take a cart, yeah. I think the Champions Tour rules stay if they play 36 at any time, I think everybody can take a cart, but this is a major championship, and it's a USGA event.

Q. Are you surprised at all heading into this week that you're going to play 36? What did you think they were going to do?

PETER JACOBSEN: I had a feeling they were going to go 36. You take the good with the bad. How I am playing well and walking again, and now I get 36, so it's kind of like, oh, okay.

Q. What's it like to be in this position?

PETER JACOBSEN: It's great, it's fabulous. Any time you play a round of golf, you want to be shooting low and winning every time you tee it up. That's what our expectation is every time we play. Seriously, I just want to be able to finish my 18 holes the first day and finish them today, and tomorrow I'm going to be trying to finish 36.

Q. Jay said he called you a wimp when he saw you stretching?

PETER JACOBSEN: Jay called me yesterday morning at 10:35 on my cell phone. He said, "This is Tom Meeks with the USGA. We flipped a coin and took a third of the field, and you're on the tee in five minutes, so we'll see you out here." Jay and I call each other all the time and leave silly, stupid messages back and forth.

Q. Would a long stretch between morning and afternoon be a liability for you tomorrow?

PETER JACOBSEN: I think it would be beneficial. I'd have a chance to sit down, stretch out and then go do it again. It's going to be interesting tomorrow.

Q. Mentally, what do you tell yourself?

PETER JACOBSEN: Just go as far as you can.

Q. You had a couple rounds before this weekend where you couldn't get through 18 holes?

PETER JACOBSEN: Right, I played the Ford Seniors two weeks ago, and I played the Pro-Am on Wednesday, and I had to withdraw.

Q. Was it ever in your mind that you wouldn't make it?

PETER JACOBSEN: No, that's the real positive to these days is I knew I could get all the way through. The Senior British, I played the Pro-Am on Tuesday and nearly couldn't play.

Q. Will there be an over-under pool?

PETER JACOBSEN: Probably amongst you guys, I don't know. Let me know what it is, so I can push myself to get them all in.

Q. You said last Saturday over in Ireland that you were getting better by the day. Was there a new stretching regimen?

PETER JACOBSEN: Yes, that's what it is. I wish I could have another three weeks because I'll be fine. The doctor told me four months, and it's been three months and a week, so it's going to get better, it just takes time. It's just the trauma from the surgery is tough to get over.

Q. Are you worried about a point tomorrow where you might have to make a decision? Are you going to push it as hard as it can go?

PETER JACOBSEN: I'm not even going to think about that. Yeah, that's a concern.

Q. Knowing you're going to be in one of the last groups tomorrow, some players might play conservative, some players might be patient. Does it change anything knowing you have 36 holes to go?

PETER JACOBSEN: No, it doesn't change anything. One thing I learned about playing on the PGA Tour, you've got to go at all the flags when you have that opportunity, and you've got to try to make your birdies. As the marketing slogan says, "These guys are good," and they are. You can pick one of ten guys -- somebody may win the tournament who's not on the leaderboard right now. If someone gets hot with their putter and they can shoot a pair of 65s and win. That's the one thing that can be a great benefit to somebody off the lead. They get going on a 36-hole day and they get hot and you get into the groove, and boom, shoot 12 to 14-under, then you sneak in and win. Keith Clearwater did it at the Colonial a few years ago, shot back-to-back 64s. The course record was 65, and he shot 65 back to back the same day.

You're going to see a lot of players in the mix on the last nine holes.

Q. You could have really put a little distance between you and the rest of the guys.

PETER JACOBSEN: No. I mean, I've been putting fabulously well. I missed a couple of putts. I made a couple of mistakes, but you're going to do that. This is a very difficult golf course. I was long and left on 5, and I had a downhill chip that was scooting away and almost chipped it off the green. The three-putt on 4 -- well, the bogey on 4 was an unforced error. I should have made birdie, and I walked off with bogey, but that happens. Golf is a very hard game, that's it. I can't explain things -- just say it's a hard game.

Q. Were you more aggressive off the tee knowing the fairways were a little more forgiving?

PETER JACOBSEN: No, none.

Q. Did you hit more drivers?

PETER JACOBSEN: No, I hit the same number of drivers that I did Thursday. I drove it off 10, I drove it off 17, I drove it off 18. I hit driver off 4, and I hit driver off 5. I hit five drivers today, same as yesterday.

By the way, the golf course was in amazing shape. The fairways were not sloppy or wet. I was concerned about maybe not playing lift, clean and place as we would on the PGA Tour, but the golf course was great. It wasn't sloppy at all. I saw pictures. The greens were perfect today.

Q. Do you think performance-enhancing substances like morphine maybe in your case should be allowed?

PETER JACOBSEN: One thing about performance-enhancing drugs or any in these sports, I don't think anybody could play a round of golf on anything because your performance is going to go this way. You may feel better, but your performance goes this way. That's why it's tough to play when it's hot and humid. You get dizzy and lose your focus, so I don't think there's any worry of that in the PGA Tour.

Q. Are you thinking of something that could give you a little more spring in your step?

PETER JACOBSEN: The only thing that will give me more spring in my step is to lose 30 pounds before tomorrow, and to do that, I'd have to hack off a leg or an arm.

Q. Back to the fairways, how much resiliency do you think is attributable to the zoysia --

PETER JACOBSEN: The zoysia grass is an amazing grass to play off of. I think the fact that it develops in the fairways helps to dissipate the water. From I understand this course drains fabulously well. It retains when you have five or ten inches in a few-hour period, but then it drains.

Q. At a different golf course, you would have been looking at a whole different world?

PETER JACOBSEN: I think so. I didn't have one bad lie out there today.

A couple holes, 2, 4, 7, and a few other on the back, but other than that, it was fine.

Q. I asked Craig about winning the (inaudible).

PETER JACOBSEN: This hip surgery has thrown a huge kink into my plans. I had planned on playing more tournaments. I missed probably eight or nine tournaments, probably four or five Champion and four or five regular Tour events. I'm happy I've played 36 holes and got that in. It's an improvement.

Q. (Inaudible).

PETER JACOBSEN: Just wear and tear. Yeah, it's an injury that happens with a lot of athletes that plant and turn. Mario Lemieux has had it, Elkington, Parnevik, Jay Fiedler, Miami dolphin quarterback. Any time you plant and rotate doing one thing or another, whether it's overhand or underhand or this way, so it's an athletic problem.

Q. Did they just trim the tears off the labrum?

PETER JACOBSEN: I tore the labrum off the bone and they had to drill three places and suture the labrum back to the bone. Tom Pritchard has had two surgeries, Norman, as I said, Jonathan Byrd, he just won last week. Jonathan Byrd had it done in February. Oh, it's a radical new surgery -- if you have a bad hip, it's going to take the place of a hip replacement.

Q. You've been pushing that athletic angle on your injury.

PETER JACOBSEN: Yeah, not that I'm an athlete. I'm as much of an athlete as a guy hanging off the back of a bass boat drinking a beer, singing country music songs, Waylon and Willie (laughter).

End of FastScripts.