THE HONDA CLASSIC

March 9, 2001

Jesper Parnevik

JESPER PARNEVIK: Of course, it was a lot harder today. This golf course I think never plays the way it did yesterday and this morning. This is a nice day, usually, when we go here. So, I'm more pleased with my round today, shooting 67, than I was with my 65 yesterday, and I played actually a lot better today.

JESPER PARNEVIK: I don't know if it's an advantage, but it's always nice to sleep in your own bed. I can relate to playing in Sweden, in my hometown there. I get a lot of support. And my family is here this week. My parents are here. You know, it's nice that way. But, you know, sometimes, like last year with Dudley, it can also be added pressure. He told me he was very nervous down -- trying to win at home. So it depends on how you take it, I say.

JESPER PARNEVIK: It was a slow start. I missed a few birdie putts early that I thought I should have made. Then I missed a 6-footer on 15 for par. But then I holed a nice 10-footer on the next hole and a 10-footer on 17, and that kind of got me going. You know, the back nine, I had two bonus birdies, I have to say. On No. 5, where it is a 190 pin and I hit a 9-iron; that's how hard the wind is blowing. You know, I holed about a 60-footer there for birdie. Same thing on No. 7. I hit it in the fairway trap and I hit a 7-iron just over the green and chipped in for birdie there. It was pretty tricky, fast chip shot. You know, I'm not surprised that the scores were that much higher this afternoon, because the greens got very, very firm later on in the round.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Yeah, it's as close to the British Open you can get, I guess. Actually Lance and I talked about that: Where do you have the bigger chance not to hit it in the bunker for 18 holes, here or St. Andrews? And I have to say St. Andrews is probably easier. It's pretty much impossible to play 18 holes here without being in one. But the bunkers are , you know, very well manicured. So the ball is actually sitting nicely in the bunker. So you can hit good golf shots out of the traps, which I like. You know, I don't like when you have too much sand in the fairway traps; so the ball is sitting down all the time.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Probably going to take another couple of years. But that other kid is doing fantastic this week, which is unbelievable. I talked to a few guys and we could hardly remember what we did when we were 16. I just remember how nervous I was at that age, probably just playing a local championship. So what he's doing here is unbelievable.

JESPER PARNEVIK: No, I didn't. I saw him on the range yesterday and he looked pretty good.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Oh, really? He's going to be the youngest?

JESPER PARNEVIK: That's still pretty good.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Yeah, my head has not really been on the golf course. It's been -- golf is such, how do I put it, golf is a lot of momentum. And I think if you are not all there, you're not going to hole those 6-footers to stay in the round or keep the momentum going or make that extra up-and-down or hole that 10-footer for birdie or so on; and that seems to be what I have not done. So the round, it seems like they tend to go one way or the other, somewhere, after a few hole, and mine always seem to go the other way. It can be that you, you know, make an up-and-down out of the trap and birdie the next, instead of missing that one and miss the next birdie. It's such a small margin, the differences in golf, what makes a good round and a bad round.

JESPER PARNEVIK: It's been the best I putted for six, seven months, I would say.

JESPER PARNEVIK: The Zen Oracle? Yeah. I practice with it. It makes me -- if I do something wrong with my putting, it's that I rush it back and I stab at it a little bit. This Zen Oracle Training System really slows down the pace of my stroke, which is very important in the wind like this, because it's easy to start rushing the putts or trying to force them in the hole because you are scared the wind is going to take them. But I really kept my rhythm the same, even though the wind has been blowing pretty hard this afternoon.

JESPER PARNEVIK: It was a guy in England who invented it. He's going to try to sell it over here.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Yeah. He gave me one in California, actually.

JESPER PARNEVIK: It seems like if somebody has an odd-looking thing, they come to me. I don't know why. (Laughter.) It's the same thing with the putter I'm using this week. It looks like something made at home in my garage, but it's working.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Oh, I think it's called Sticky Golf.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Oh, he gave it to me last night and said, "Why don't you try this tomorrow."

JESPER PARNEVIK: Yeah.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Oh, something from outer space almost. It's very bizarre looking, I don't know.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Both of them. The device looks like a doughnut and the putter looks like a spaceship almost.

JESPER PARNEVIK: No. Two different guys.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Yeah, it seems like the tougher the conditions, when it comes to wind, I seem to play better. It's just that I think I free up my mind and I pretty much just focus on the shape of shot I've got to hit, like swing thoughts and all that disappear. Because in this wind, if you don't hit it with a cut or a draw, if you get the wrong spin on the ball, the error is going to be 40 yards extra just because of the wind. It seems like -- I don't know what it is. I like to play around with the ball, high shots, low shots and drive it both right or left. So I like the wind to blow.

JESPER PARNEVIK: I did not, no. But I always enjoy fooling around in the rain, hitting a lot of different shots. That's pretty much how I practice. I never will seem to be -- mechanics or video and stuff like that. I just like to play around on the range and hitting different shots.