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MASTERS TOURNAMENT

April 8, 2011

Jim Furyk

AUGUSTA, GEORGIA

Q. Talk about your day.
JIM FURYK: It helped to get off to a pretty good start. Birdieing 3 and 5, I guess. So kind of a, after yesterday, got off to a bad start, couldn't quite squeeze as much out of the round as I could have and I knew that if I played a good round today I could get back in the hunt.
So it was good to kind of get off to a good start, relax a little bit, and it allowed me to be a little bit more patient. And I still left a couple out there, but I played pretty solid.

Q. Talk about your play on 18.
JIM FURYK: Yeah, I've been struggling with some drives and two holes on the back nine I struggled with, 10 and 18, I hit errant tee shots, both to the right. And I had to play kind of a good second shot low.
I wanted to set it up left if I could for the angle, knowing that I could play it off that ridge and bring it back somewhere close to the hole. But it was a late reaction, the way it hit, I was thinking, oh, no, maybe it caught the upper shelf, because there wasn't any cheers early, but then I got the late applause and it sounded like it almost went in. So it was nice to get a tap in par after that drive and having to scramble.

Q. How much tougher was the course playing today would you say?
JIM FURYK: Oh, maybe a little bit. It was pretty similar. It seemed like as the last two holes the greens were quite a bit firmer, I thought.
I felt like 17 and 18, the green on 17 was firm. And 18 I felt it when I fixed the ball mark I was wondering maybe if they're going dry out maybe a little this afternoon, but they were pretty receptive this morning and really the breeze was only the, it was maybe a touch easier than yesterday, but it played pretty similar.

Q. If you had to pick a difficult hole today, what would that have been for you?
JIM FURYK: I guess it was 10 because that was the one I bogeyed.
I think that stretch when you hit like 9, 10, 11, 12, I think it's a really key stretch for me. There's a couple difficult drives in there. 11 is a very tough hole, so I think I got through those even par today, which I had a good round going and that kind of kept me going and then I could gain some momentum, because you have pins that are, the pin at 14 is accessible and you have 13, 14, 15 to make some ground up. And I was able to get a couple more under through there.

Q. Looking at the weekend, what are you going to do now?
JIM FURYK: Well, we'll kind of have to see tonight how -- McIlroy's still on the golf course playing really well and there will be a lot of guys gunning and firing at him.
So I'll just go and figure out where the leaders are later on this evening and my game plan will stay very similar to what I've been trying to do, be patient, try to attack the pins and the holes that I think there's a possibility.
To me 11 is a conservative hole, you won't see me firing at many pins there, unless I get a perfect scenario. But I'll pretty much try to attack the golf course the same way and right now I need to figure out a way -- I would say the weakness right now in my game is usually my strength, that's driving the ball.
And I'm missing a few fairways here and there and it's cost me, I made double on the very first hole of the tournament with a shot that I hit way right and I hit about two or -- I hit better drives today, but I still hit about three really poor tee shots and I was able to get out of it with it only costing me one shot on number 10. But I need to start driving the ball better for the weekend.

Q. On 12 today what did you hit?
JIM FURYK: I hit kind of a choked up 7-iron. Knocked it in there about eight feet and made it for birdie.

Q. What do you look at to gauge the wind? Do you have a spot you pick up, look at the 13th tee? Do you have a strategy to figure the wind direction?
JIM FURYK: Actually, I try to play with what the wind's been doing all day. Does that make sense? So today I felt that, I thought it was mostly a westerly wind and so I tried to play it as a westerly wind on that hole and try to not get caught up in -- it's hard not to get caught up with what the flags are doing or trees are doing -- try to take a look at the clouds up above and gauge. That's easy to say, but when you think it's howling and 11 is coming right at you, it makes it tough that you got to err on the long side.

Q. What did you hit yesterday?
JIM FURYK: I think I hit kind of a choked up 7 yesterday as well. I hit two good shots in there and made two twos, so far, so I feel like I'm stealing a couple there.

Q. Can you comment on Freddie? He's 5-under for the Tournament at age 51 and on the leaderboard and he seems to always play well when he gets here.
JIM FURYK: Yeah, I think that the two places -- I'm never surprised to see him -- but the two places you almost expect him to play well are at Riviera and at Augusta. So he was leading after two rounds at Riviera this year and here he is right back in the hunt at Augusta.
So he's had so much success over the years, he loves the place, I mean both of those play rest suit him as well, so it's probably a warm feeling when gets on the grounds.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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