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THE OPEN CHAMPIONSHIPJuly 13, 2011Martin KaymerSANDWICH, ENGLAND MARTIN PARK: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. We'd like to welcome Martin Kaymer to the interview centre. Welcome to Royal St. George's. You played a few holes today and yesterday and Monday, so you've had a bit of experience with all the weather conditions. Give us your thoughts on the course. MARTIN KAYMER: Yeah, I played on Monday 18, yesterday nine and this morning nine holes. Yesterday and today the wind was very similar, so it was nice to play a different golf course than Monday because Monday was completely different wind. So I could play the golf course in two different kind of conditions, which was nice. Yeah, obviously the greens are very slopey, very difficult, and some approaches seem to be impossible sometimes, but that's fine. It's a big challenge, and we are the best players in the world here, so it should be tough. At the end of the day everybody has to deal with the same golf course. MARTIN PARK: Your Open record is actually improving. MARTIN KAYMER: Yeah, I wouldn't mind improving again. I think I finished tied for seventh last year. It's a favourite golf tournament all year. It's a fantastic major, the only one that we have in Europe, and I think the U.S. Open and PGA, they're very -- I would almost say it's a regular PGA TOUR tournament, just more difficult conditions, and obviously the field is good. But the British Open is so different than all the other tournaments, and that makes it very special and new. You have to be very creative and you have to think a lot, and mentally it's very tiring. Of course some days you get some good breaks, some days you get some bad breaks, but that is what the golf course and the golf tournament is about. That is what I like about it. It's not normal. You have to play different golf sometimes. Q. Can you tell us the state of your game at the moment and your level of confidence going into The Open. MARTIN KAYMER: The good thing about the British Open, you don't have to play, let's say, beautiful golf; you have to score well. I'm playing every week I play better golf since I played in Munich, since I saw my coach, I'm playing better and my confidence is getting higher and higher. It was a great week in France. That was my last tournament I played. I probably had a very good chance to win that golf tournament, or I should have won it. Just did a couple mistakes early in the round. But it was a good preparation for The Open, too, because the golf course played very fast and firm, and I was playing fine. I was playing good golf, and that was important for me to get in this week or two, to come into The Open with a good finish in France. Q. This is a golden era for European golf, how much do you guys spur each other on when you see Graeme have a great win or now recently Rory? These are the guys that you've grown up with and you've played with. How much does that motivate you to go out there and do it yourself? MARTIN KAYMER: Well, first of all, I think it's obviously fantastic for European golf at the moment. It's nice to see, especially the way Rory won the U.S. Open. A lot of people, they thought that he maybe cannot bring it home after the Masters, but the way he played on Sunday was very impressive and nice to see that he kept being aggressive. And those things, when I was watching the last round -- when I was done with my round, I was watching I think the back nine when Rory played, and the way he played made me feel like I want to -- I need to practice more. I need to go back to the driving range, I need to hit more balls, need to become a better player, because he played that golf course, I think, almost in a perfect way. Of course it motivates you and inspires you. Q. If the tournament is played in this kind of wind, what are the most difficult shots out there and why? MARTIN KAYMER: I think every single shot is difficult, even the short putts. I think the tee shots, they're not so difficult, because the fairways are pretty wide. You just need to avoid the bunkers. That's always a penalty if you're in the bunker. You just need to chip it out and go from there. But I think the key shots this week are going to be those six- to ten-footers for par that you have to save. You will miss greens and you will have some long putts with a lot of slopes between you and the hole, and it's very tough to hit them to a foot or to two feet, so that's why I think there will be plenty of putts between six and ten feet that you have to save for par. Q. Do you think this tournament will be won and lost on the greens as opposed to anywhere else? MARTIN KAYMER: I think it's a lot about the short game here. So Luke Donald has a good chance, I think. Q. You've played with Bernhard Langer yesterday and afterwards he was talking about you in glowing terms. I was wondering if you could talk about some of the things you chatted about with Bernhard on the course yesterday, and how much inspiration he has been to you in your career. MARTIN KAYMER: Well, certainly he has been. Yesterday we talked a little bit about his finishes here when he played here. I think, what was it, '81, he said he should have won it, that tournament, but he missed a short one on the 1st hole I think he said, and it annoyed him a little bit. And then we talked a little bit about the golf course, what has changed, and obviously about the upcoming weeks. We talked a little bit about Munich, about this week, how the BMW played, a little bit about his injury, that he couldn't practice the last few weeks a lot. But of course Bernhard was and still is a big inspiration, not only the way he plays golf but the way he handles himself in the media and in his private life, as well. He has a very nice family, and he keeps the family together and has a very strong team behind him, and that is -- I think you don't find that very often. I have a lot of respect for his family and especially for his success that he had. Q. Would you say of all The Open Championship venues that this is the most mentally challenging golf course? MARTIN KAYMER: We'll see on Sunday, but I just think the British Open and the Masters, those are the two most tiring weeks for the year, because here obviously you have the weather, as well, that plays a big role. On those golf courses when you play The Open sometimes you don't even see the fairway, you just see rough and some bunkers and the landscaping and the background. You need to be very precise with targets. You take the right of the TV tower or the left of the grandstands. So you have to be very precise with your targets, and that makes you -- obviously you have to think a lot, and if you have to be more precise, it takes more energy. You have to concentrate more and focus more. And you have to be like this probably on every single shot, even the lay-ups. You have to give yourself good angles to the green. So it's a very tiring week. Q. Is that particularly the case at Royal St. George's as opposed to -- MARTIN KAYMER: Well, I think -- no, I don't think it's any different to the other three British Opens that I've played. Last year at St. Andrews you have to be very precise, as well. You can play the golf course in so many different ways, so many different ways to play a golf ball. So I don't think it's different than the other three that I've played. MARTIN PARK: Martin, thank you very much, and good luck this week. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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