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CME GROUP TITLEHOLDERS

November 17, 2011

Cristie Kerr

ORLANDO, FLORIDA

THE MODERATOR: We'd like to welcome Cristie Kerr into the interview room. Congratulations on a great round today, 4-under par. Can you just take me a little bit through the day and what was working well for you.
CRISTIE KERR: I'm a little under the weather so forgive me if I have trouble remembering. I got off to a good start, 1-under the first couple holes, and then on 7 I hit it stiff, made birdie. Good birdie on 8 and a great putt on 9. So that got me off to a really good start for the front nine.
Unfortunately I three-putted 10 but just bounced right back at 14 and 15, and then the 16th hole is playing really long. I hit 5-wood in and almost got up-and-down. But I made a good par on 17 and a good up-and-down on 18, and it felt good to get a good round, considering I really didn't expect much of myself today.
THE MODERATOR: You didn't play in the pro-am yesterday since you have been feeling under the weather. How long have you been feeling under weather and did you feel at all better today?
CRISTIE KERR: Well, those nine-hole pro-ams you want to play in. The 18-hole ones are a little long, but it would have been nice to -- I only played nine holes on Tuesday. But Tuesday morning the doctor I saw, Dr. Thomas, seemed to think it's something I got from Mexico. I started getting -- I woke up on Tuesday and felt kind of a little tired but just kind of felt fatigued and started getting some abdominal pains, and the other stuff I'm not going to mention.

Q. Usual Mexican stuff?
CRISTIE KERR: Yeah, usual Mexican runs, and just really just got out in the afternoon and played my whole practice round, practiced the whole entire time like abdominal pain and it just seemed to be getting worse, these pains in my intestines or stomach or whatever, and I've never really experienced that before.
You know, I woke up -- I did not feel well, and on Tuesday night, middle of the night, which was Wednesday morning, I just got up at 2:00 in the morning and my friend Suzanne, who's my trainer and my friend who's here, I asked her to come up and see me because I just did not feel well. I had some toast and some banana and some Gatorade because I really didn't eat dinner on Tuesday, and that's when I called Dr. Thomas and he got me some medicine, but I just was in bed all day yesterday.
I still -- even today I feel fatigued, I felt kind of light-headed coming around the turn and still had some of these pains, these shooting pains in my abdomen. Like I said, I didn't expect much from myself today. Maybe that's what it takes.

Q. With a little bit of luck you could have probably had four or five wins by mid season this year and then you had the wrist problem at the Solheim. Now you've got a stomach bug. Is this season just frustrating? Does it just kind of feel like it's your best golf just barely out of reach?
CRISTIE KERR: Yeah, absolutely. It's felt like a bit of bad luck. It's felt like -- you know, some of the tournaments where I came in second I played awesome but somebody played better. That's the way it goes sometimes. It is frustrating, and yeah, having the tendonitis, I went to the doctor in New York and got an MRI. I actually showed him a picture of the swelling of what it looked like the day after the Solheim Cup, and he was like, you played with that? This is one of the top wrist guys at HSS.
So I battled through the Solheim Cup as much as I could. I was trying to be there for my team, now I get sick now.
Well, in Asia I was trying to baby this wrist and not practice too much. It's frustrating, I've never had to deal with trying to pay attention to an injury like that. And then getting sick here, it's kind of the way the year has gone. But maybe somebody will smile on me this week.

Q. It's been a long stretch that you have not had at least one win. Do you come in with a little urgency or maybe self-imposed pressure?
CRISTIE KERR: Well, I always put pressure on myself. I feel like I play well when I put pressure on myself but I'm not like -- it's kind of a fine balance. I got sick on Tuesday, and I thought it was kind of going to go away and then it didn't, and what happened to me yesterday, I just sort of just kind of was like, I'm just going to play the best that I can and see what happens because yesterday was not an easy day.

Q. The illness, did it change the way you approached any of the holes because of weakness or not being able to hit it necessarily as far as you normally would?
CRISTIE KERR: Actually not really. I actually -- while I was tired today, I was actually hitting the ball fairly well and pretty solid. I hit it right a couple times, but that's par for the course. But yesterday I couldn't even really get out of bed. I had somebody bring me food at like 2:00 in the morning, just some toast to try and calm things down, and I got up at like noon and had like a small bowl of oatmeal and I got up at 3:00 and had some scrambled eggs and then I really didn't eat the rest of the day. I tried to force fluids and whatnot, but I was just so weak I couldn't really get out of bed yesterday. I've never had a stomach flu that bad before. Like I said, today I didn't really expect anything out of myself, and I was dragging a little bit the whole back nine and I tried to just kind of hang in there, and I ended up playing pretty well.

Q. Did you come close to WD'ing? Did it cross your mind?
CRISTIE KERR: Well, I didn't know how I was going to feel this morning. I figured if I at all can walk around and swing at it, I would go and play. That's the other thing, too; I hate missing pro-ams. I like an extra practice day before the tournament, and this tournament is so weird, there weren't any alternates. I texted Doug at like 3:00 in the morning and I talked to him at 6:00, and I said, are there any alternates here, and he goes, there's no alternates, and I was like, my God, because you never want to do that to a great sponsor who's putting on a great tournament like this. I really feel horrible about missing the pro-am, but I really couldn't get out of bed, and if there weren't any alternates it's an unfortunate situation. I think there were even seven or eight other players that were supposed to play in this field that didn't end up for some reason. So it's unfortunate.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you very much. Hope you feel better.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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