WGC ANDERSEN CONSULTING MATCH PLAY CHAMPIONSHIP

February 22, 2000

Jesper Parnevik

JESPER PARNEVIK: I'm probably playing the best golf in my career right now. And I took the last ten weeks off last year, I kind of tried to get in good shape and relax a little bit, get some time off golf, and it seemed like it's helped a lot. I'm probably hitting my irons as well as I ever have. And when the putts go in, it seems like I'll have a chance to win.

JESPER PARNEVIK: I still have the irregular heartbeat. The problem is probably going to be there forever, I guess. It's something I've had for probably 12 years, about 12 years. And it just got really bad last summer. And it just got to the point where I felt I was not in control of the problem anymore. And I talked to a few guys about it and Harry is one of them. And I decided to take the last ten weeks off of the year, and pretty much try to see what the problem was, and see if they could cure it somehow. And right now I feel a lot better. I still have the irregular heartbeat, but the really bad symptoms have at least been gone for a while now.

JESPER PARNEVIK: It's hard to explain. It's like a feeling that you're having a heart attack. That's pretty much it. I mean it mostly happened at nighttime, when I went to bed. And it was just a case of the heart rushing away, beating like crazy, and feeling like you can't breathe, or your chest is about to explode. And it was just not only very uncomfortable, but it was just a feeling that you didn't know what was going on. Even though I've had irregular heartbeat for a long time, this was so far beyond that feeling that I really felt I had to see some doctors and get some medical advice about it.

JESPER PARNEVIK: I've been offered a lot of different medications, but I've stayed away from that so far, hoping that it was going to go away naturally. Those last ten weeks I took off last year pretty much, just relaxing, working out a lot, trying to get really in good shape, seems like it's helped a lot. And I would love for it to go away on its own without surgery or medications, so that's what I'm looking forward to right now.

JESPER PARNEVIK: It depends on which doctors you ask. Some doctors think it's not going to go away, and some say it is possible. I just have to wait to see.

JESPER PARNEVIK: No, I actually never had the problem on the golf course. Even last year where I felt really bad, example just before the Ryder Cup I had some really bad ones, and during the actual play it's not like my heart started racing or anything like that. It doesn't seem like the pressure in the golf tournaments affects it at all. It's more off the golf course. And in fact when I'm relaxing, that's when it can happen the worst.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Yeah, like I said, I made a lot of birdies this year. I actually lost track now how many. But I remember it was something like 75 the first three weeks, which is unbelievable. I never made that many birdies ever before. And, yeah, it's been the double bogeys that hurt my chances to win some of the tournaments, some triple bogeys I've had. But like you said, in match play birdies are much more important than doubles and triples. I'm looking forward to that this week. Because I feel very confident now, I can go out, play 18 holes and even if I start like I did last week, I mean I had three bogeys and a double on front 9 on Thursday, but I still felt -- when you make so many birdies, you have that confidence in you that you're going to make five or six birdies, whatever happens. And it's a very good feeling to have.

JESPER PARNEVIK: I think most guys really enjoy match play, and they did so last year, too. But the Ryder Cup has done a lot for the golfing world. And last year you have to realize that an event like this, where you have the top 64 players in the world, and as good as the players are these days, over 18 hole match play, anyone can beat anyone on any day, and that's probably going to happen this year, too. You're going to see a lot of so-called unknown guys beat a lot of the top names. You might be right there that some of players are gearing up for this tournament more than they did last year.

JESPER PARNEVIK: I was very impressed with him at the Ryder Cup, I have to say. I hadn't played that many rounds with him before Ryder Cup, but he played absolutely great there. And what he did in the last game with Mark O'Meara I thought was impressive. He's one of those guys you really don't know what you have, because he can play unbelievable golf when he's on.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Iron play. I would say 75, 80 percent of my birdies come now from putts within four or five feet, which is all because of the iron game. I'm stiffing so many more shots now than I've ever done before. Actually about ten years ago, when I was younger, I used to have a really good iron game, but then my putting was a little bit on the weak side. But now I feel like I'm putting very well, within ten feet, so that's where all the birdies come from.

JESPER PARNEVIK: I don't know. I worked out very hard last winter. I don't know if strength can improve your iron game that much, but that's the only reason I can find right now where I've really made an effort to improve is in strength. And it's not that I went all winter long working on a swing, and now it's clicking, it was one of those weird scenarios where on Wednesday at the Pro Am in Maui, I had this swing feel and it worked great. And it's been sticking with me since that date.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Not as much as this now. It's almost once or twice a day, so I'm really making an effort to get stronger.

JESPER PARNEVIK: One thing was of course the heart condition. Then it just seems like the way Tiger is raising the bar every week these days. All the guys are seeming to make a harder effort to improve their games any way they can. It's not just hitting balls on the range, they try to improve mentally and physically and whatever they can do. And I guess it's all Tiger's fault, really (laughter).

JESPER PARNEVIK: Yes, I'm going to play three or four times in Europe. I really haven't decided what tournaments. Of course the British Open, maybe Loch Lomond, Scandinavian Masters, and maybe the SAP, but I haven't really made up my schedule.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Definitely. I would love to join the Tour this year as well, but we had this problem with the NEC Invitational, that did not count towards the European events or I was not part of the tournament anymore, so I felt it could be hard for me to reach the 11 events this year.

JESPER PARNEVIK: I've always been able to gear it up when I need to hit it much, much further. Usually it's just a range swing I use just for fun. No. 10 last week is definitely one of those holes where you could, like you said swing out of your shoes and go for it. But it's not one of those swings that I would feel comfortable hitting at say the Bob Hope, actually I've probably done the opposite, I'm cutting off some distance with my drives, just to make sure I get it in play, because I feel so comfortable with my iron game right now.

JESPER PARNEVIK: I don't think anyone thinks about it that way. I don't think anyone makes up their schedules looking where he's not playing.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Well, I haven't really thought about it that way. I really don't know. I think most guys enjoy when he's in the field because they know there's going to be big crowds and all that. So I don't think anyone really have felt a relief when he's not showing up.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Of course, the media is much bigger, the crowds are much bigger, so I really hope he could play every week. It would just be great for golf.

JESPER PARNEVIK: I haven't met him yet, but I'm sure we're going to meet this week, because I know he's here.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Oh, yeah. I'm one of those guys that really enjoy playing social golf with friends and family, so on. I have some fun betting games and outside the PGA TOUR. And I could play pretty much every day on my off time, because I really enjoy playing golf.

JESPER PARNEVIK: I hope so. Golf is very open in Sweden. We don't have that many private golf courses, most all are public, and they're building a lot of golf courses, because you're always going to run into problem when you have this golfing boom that right now for some golf courses there's a long line to get in. They're building a lot of golf courses, to try to make sure that everybody can play somewhere, because right now I think we're up to almost half a million people playing golf in Sweden, and we're only 8, 9 million people in the whole country. It's grown really fast. We need a lot more golf courses right now.

JESPER PARNEVIK: Not yet. But I'm sure he will.

End of FastScripts...