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NORTHERN TRUST OPENFebruary 16, 2012J.B. HolmesPACIFIC PALISADES, CALIFORNIA LAURA HILL: We'd like to welcome J.B. Holmes to the interview room, a nice 67 today, especially in some tough, windy conditions out there, and after all you've been going through in the last couple months it must feel good to get off to this kind of start. JB HOLMES: Yeah, it feels great to get out here and put in a good round right off the bat. Made a bunch of birdies, a few mistakes, but overall it was a very good round for me, especially in these conditions. Q. Talk about the conditions. Obviously the wind has been a factor everybody has been talking about all day. How was it for you, and then as the round went on it seemed like it died down towards the end. How much did that impact what you were able to do? JB HOLMES: Yeah, it was blowing really hard all day. You really had to be real precise with your lines, especially striking your irons going in. You had to make sure you flushed it because the wind would definitely move it around quite a bit. I started off great, and then it died down a little bit at the end, and actually when it got a little bit easier I made a few mistakes. My record was a little bit better when the wind was blowing real hard. Like I said, overall it was a really good day for me. It was really difficult. We got about four holes where the wind wasn't blowing. It was whipping most of the day on us. Q. What's the biggest change in your game do you think from last week at Pebble? JB HOLMES: You know, I was swinging pretty good last week. I didn't‑‑ my score didn't reflect really how I felt like I was playing, so it was just kind of one of those weeks where a couple bad things happened and I didn't putt as well. All of a sudden I put up a pretty big number out there. I felt like it was coming on. I felt like I was playing better. I really felt pretty good this week practicing and coming up to this golf course. I really enjoy playing here. I like the layout of this golf course. I felt like I could shoot a pretty good score today. Q. How far have you come since San Diego, which was your first tournament back, and we talked to you then, and of course you were a little tentative. Are you back in the flow now like nothing had happened? JB HOLMES: Maybe not that much, but it definitely‑‑ it's improved every week. I feel like my swing got a little bit better. I didn't hit it very good at all, my irons, at San Diego, and driver was just so‑so. I feel like each week my swing has definitely gotten a little bit better and improved a little bit. My swing speed has slowly come back a little bit being out here and playing this much. It's definitely improved a little bit every week as to what I was hoping. I'm probably not quite 100 percent, but I definitely feel a whole lot better with my swing and my game and everything right now than I did at San Diego for sure. Q. You were on a launch monitor this week. Are you looking at ball speed? You just mentioned swing speed. I'm just curious what you're looking at, and are you close to where you were before? JB HOLMES: Yeah, I was just looking at swing speed. I hit a few. Last time I was on it was in San Diego, and I was just seeing if it picked up a little bit. In San Diego, last year I averaged 120 and if I swung at it real hard I could get it to 125, 126, and the highest I could get it at San Diego was about 117. I feel like probably the highest I can get it now is probably 120. So it's coming back. My average swing is probably 3, 4 miles an hour below normal, but it's a lot closer with my irons on my yardages and everything, so it's coming back, and I feel a little bit more like I know my irons and the distances a little better. Q. What Callaway driver is that? JB HOLMES: FT Tour. Q. And what's the loft and what's the length? JB HOLMES: It's just standard length, I don't know. Q. 45? JB HOLMES: I don't know what it is. I think it's 7.2 on the loft. It says 8.5, but that's not what it is. It's probably 7.5, something like that. I just hit it. Q. The loss of swing speed, was that a result of the brain issue? JB HOLMES: Yeah, that was just from the surgery. They had to go in between muscles in my neck, and it really made my neck where I couldn't turn it as much, so getting the rotation back in my neck and really feeling like I could swing at it after your neck has been that stiff and starting back it was really hard for me to go down and get the ball. I wanted to stand up. And even out here I was still fighting a little bit. I actually topped one in Phoenix where I was standing up a little bit. It's something I'm fighting, been fighting the last few weeks, and it's becoming a little bit easier to not think about it as much and stay down on the ball a little bit better. Q. What did you hit in your second shot on 1, and was it much different than say you hit a year ago? JB HOLMES: I hit it way right on 1, so I was over in the trees. I hit a 3‑iron out of there and wedged it on and made a putt. Yeah, the wind‑‑ I didn't really see the wind blowing that hard in that direction, so it would have been different than any other year anyways. Normally I hit a 3‑wood on that hole and I was trying to really flight a driver and just got it up in the wind and sailed it right. Q. You can be a pretty emotional guy. I'm just wondering, does it affect you sometimes that people consider you such a long driver and perhaps overlook some of the other assets of your game, some of the things you do really well? JB HOLMES: I mean, you just get used to it. As a long hitter, pretty much I've been a long hitter all my life, so everybody thinks if you hit it a long ways you can't chip and putt, and that's not true. There's a ton of good players out here. If you're even out here, you've got a pretty good short game. But yeah, I mean, people want to see you hit it a long ways. That's what everybody wants to see, and it can get overlooked. But that all goes away if you start playing well and win tournaments. LAURA HILL: J.B. thanks for coming down. Good luck the rest of the week. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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