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U.S. SENIOR OPEN CHAMPIONSHIP

July 27, 2011

Bob Tway

TOLEDO, OHIO

PETE KOWALSKI: Okay, we'd like to welcome Bob Tway to the Senior Open media center. Inverness is a place that Bob probably has some good memories of, I'm sure. Did you play in '93 as well as the PGA?
BOB TWAY: Uh-huh.
PETE KOWALSKI: So give us an historical look back at your memories of coming back here, and what it's like now coming back to the Champions Tour event and the Senior USGA Championship here at Inverness.
BOB TWAY: First of all, it's kind of hard to imagine that it's been 25 years. It just goes to show how fast time goes by. But it's always great to come back here. I've actually been back quite a bit.
I played in '93. I did an outing for the Dannon Company in the late '80s here. And then recently I've watched I guess four college events here: Three fall tournaments and then the NCAA Championship three years ago. So though I haven't played, I've been here a lot. It's always been a lot of fun to come back here.
To play the last couple of days, each time you sign an autograph, I think all of the people out there today were there in '86, because everybody remembers the bunker shot. That, by far, is the highlight of my golf career, no doubt about it.
Winning the PGA Championship in the fashion that I won it and making that shot, that's what everybody remembers. I think -- people ask me, why do you think they remember that shot so much? I think it's because bunker shots to a lot of people are difficult, and I think that's kind of why people remember it.

Q. Certainly people would remember you if you didn't make that shot, but how much more are you a part of the golf history that you did make that particular shot and win that tournament? Is?
BOB TWAY: Well, I think that's they might remember you won the PGA, but there's not as many people that would have remembered. There's no doubt about it. Lot of people don't know if it was the PGA or U.S. Open or something, they just remember the shot.
So there's no doubt about it that that shot is something that's shown when the PGA Championship is coming up. So it's always on TV there, sometimes it's in Top 10 shots or different things. So the shot is kind of what people remember, no doubt about it.

Q. How many times have you tried to recreate it?
BOB TWAY: Well, you know, Golf Digest flew me back about a month later when I was playing at Akron at the World Series. They told me it was kind of an instructional thing, but then, over to the side, there was a guy keeping track of where I hit all the shots.
But I hit 20 shots. I didn't make any. Since then I don't really remember getting in there and doing it, and the reason I did is because I can't do any better so I just leave it alone.
It was fun. We just finished up there, and we're having The Senior Open in 2014 at my club, Oak Tree, in Oklahoma. So we've got a bunch of -- well, our owner and a bunch of members up here this week going around with the USGA and learning about different things. So I had one of my members get in the bunker and try to hit the shot, so that was kind of fun.
But like I said, I don't feel a need to get in there and try to hit it. I just remember what happened that day.

Q. What about the ball that you holed out that day? Do you have that displayed?
BOB TWAY: No, I think the club has the ball and the club, I'm pretty sure.

Q. Ever wonder if you ever had the occasion to actually talk to Greg about the shot?
BOB TWAY: I haven't talked to Greg too much about it, no (laughing).

Q. Just curious.
BOB TWAY: No.

Q. From your practice rounds, how much is the course different from the last time you were here?
BOB TWAY: I tell you what, this is quite a golf course. I always thought it was an unbelievable golf course, but I don't know where you're all going to put the tees. But with the rerouting of the holes, the backside, starting at No. 12 is a pretty unbelievable golf course. 12, 13, 14, 15,16, 17, are maybe the hardest stretch of holes that I played. You could make them easier by moving the tees up.
We played the back tees on every one of them, and I know it's been done for a while. Because the kids with the NCAA play the back tees. They even play the back tee on No. 9, so they've given us a break there. But the golf course is fabulous.
You've got to remember that technology has changed. The ball is going farther. But we are hitting much longer shots in even with the technology with the new tees than we did in '86 or '93. There is no doubt about it.
Holes like 17 today I hit a good drive and a 5 or a 6-iron, that used to be a 3-wood and a shorter iron. Old No. 5, which is now 14, was an iron or a 3-wood, and now it's a drive and a good long iron. Lot of people are hitting rescues into quite a few holes.
So the golf course is a tremendous test. Very, very difficult. Even the frontside now that used to be the backside that goes back and forth, 13, 14, 15, 16, they're all difficult holes. There is no letup. The only short holes are 1, 2, 10, 11, and 18, and they're not like they're easy holes, they're just shorter. So it's going to be a very, very tough test.

Q. It wasn't exactly like that was the only good shot you hit back in 1986. You set the course record on Saturday. Norman was the immediate preceding major champion having won the Open Championship, then you trailed by four shots. Can you give us the lead up -- four shots at the turn -- can you give us the lead-up on that back nine? Some troubles with Greg, and you had that birdie at 13, but tell us what was going through your mind and why was it so emotional to you and your wife, Tammie, after the victory?
BOB TWAY: You know, we got stopped on the second hole because of weather, so we didn't really even get going on Sunday. So we come back and the greens were faster that next morning than they had been all week. Most people don't remember the 7th hole which is now going to be 16, a very difficult par-4 up the hill.
Greg and I both hit it about 15 feet beyond the hole. Greg was just about a foot inside me. Well, I hit the putt, missed the putt, and it rolled off the green and into the rough. Right after I did that, Greg's got to putt and he did the exact same thing and he's a foot from me in the rough.
So I chipped up four feet past the hole, and he actually hit a better chip short of the hole and tapped it in, and now I've got to make a four footer knowing if I miss the hole I'm back down in the rough again. So I remember that hole a lot.
Then I remember making the turn, getting on the 10th tee, and looking up at the clubhouse and Jeff Sluman's sitting up in the window. I don't know, to this day I get a kick out of that. Slu's telling me play good like that.
And I got a lucky break and Greg got an unlucky break on No. 11. He drove it through a sand divot which none of us like, and then fatted the second shot a little bit and it buried in the bunker. The pin was in the front right of the green. So from there he had no shot. I can't remember if he barely got it out or hit it long and three-putted. But anyway, he made double bogey.
Now instead of four shots, it's two shots and that's a whole different ballgame. I hit a very, very good 1-iron. It's funny to say 1-iron because we don't even use them anymore. But on the par-5, 13 on the green, and two-putted for birdie and now it's only one shot, so now it's a whole different deal.
You're right. I had won three tournaments prior to that, and Greg and I were number one and two on the money list so both of us had been playing very, very well. So I think that's kind of what I liked about it is it was kind of the guys who had played the best that year were coming down the last few holes.
I don't remember how I got even. I can't remember if I birdied 16 or if he made another bogey. I don't, for some reason, I don't remember. But we were tied going to 17. People always talk about the shot on 18, but 17 was -- I hit it to the right of the green. And when I walked up to it the marshals were actually standing over it, and it took them a while to find the ball. It was the worst lie I've ever seen.
I asked the gentleman, I said, it's okay, tell me did someone step on this looking for it? He said, oh, no, no, I don't know if they did or not. But they probably would have been too embarrassed to say yes, but the lie was just horrible. The only saving grace was the pin was on the far side of the green, and I hit a big flop shot, got lucky, it trickled down three feet short of the hole and I made it. But without having that up and down, that last hole wouldn't have been so significant.
But like you say, in a golf tournament, many, many things happen other than what people remember on the last hole. And you're getting back to the third round, the 64 I shot was one of the best rounds of golf I've ever played. Any time in a major tournament you shoot a course record and you know you've done something right.
I played with Freddy Couples and Aoki that day. I remember putting very well, and I putted well that whole year. So there were a lot of good things that happened.
I want to say one other thing. Prior to that tournament I had played the British Open at Turnberry. The weather, if you remember in '86, was horrific. Greg had that lead and didn't end up winning -- no, he won that one. That was the one he won. He led the other two majors at the start of the year at the Open and Masters and didn't win.
So my swing was all out of kilter. I missed the cut the next two starts. So I went home prior to coming up here in the PGA, and it was 105Â° at home in Oklahoma, so I wasn't enthusiastic about practicing a whole lot. But each evening on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday evening I'd go out at 6:00 o'clock and hit some balls each evening. For some reason something clicked in my golf swing.
So when I got up here, I didn't play great the first two days, but things felt pretty good. It had gotten back to how I started playing at the start of the year, and I was very pleased with how I played those last two days.

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