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WGC ACCENTURE MATCH PLAY CHAMPIONSHIPFebruary 21, 2012Luke DonaldMARANA, ARIZONA LAURA HILL: We'd like to welcome Luke Donald to the interview room, our 2011 is Accenture Accenture winner, defending champion. This is kind of where it started last year. Give us your reaction on being back and looking forward to defending your title. LUKE DONALD: Yeah, a lot of great memories here last year, a lot of great things happened to me after I won here. I gained a lot of confidence from my win and how I went about winning it. And I'm excited to be back. I've always enjoyed the challenge of match play, and hopefully I can have another good week. Q. I noticed you led the final round scoring last year, about 16 rounds. I wonder if you find there's a correlation for getting up to play match play and getting up for a final round, the motivation? LUKE DONALD: Well, I suppose if you're in a situation in the final round, there's less people in with a chance to win. And match play is a little like that, it's one against one. I kind of enjoy that challenge of just having to beat one guy. In a similar way, when you're playing in the last group against someone, it's a similar kind of situation. There's less people that have a chance to win. You know, I've always enjoyed match play. I've enjoyed the fact that it's helpful to be consistent, to be‑‑ not put yourself‑‑ not lose holes carelessly. And for whatever reason that the format seems to suit my game. Q. Just assess your start so far. You've got a few rounds under your belt, and what's been working and not working, and what do you need to polish up as we get into the meat of the season? LUKE DONALD: Abu Dhabi was a week for me to shake off a little rust. I didn't spend a huge amount on my game leading up to that week. Last week I did spend quite a bit of time practicing in preparation for that week. It didn't go quite to plan. Riviera is that kind of a golf course, though, that you can just be a little bit off and it can eat you up. I struggled on the greens last week. I've had a tendency to struggle on poa annua. I didn't grow up on it. I played with Aaron Baddeley who grew up on it, and I'm struggling to make six footers out there. I have had success there so I like going back. It's a classic course. I've struggled for the last couple of years for some reason. Certainly the work I've been doing. I feel like I have good control of my ball. I'm starting to shape the ball a little bit more, have a little bit more control hitting it both ways. And I'm still excited for the rest of the year. Q. Would you be the top seed? And Ernie Els would be the last seed, nonetheless, talk about matching up with Ernie? LUKE DONALD: Well, yeah, as the No.1 seed, you know, someone being a 64, you probably wouldn't have picked Ernie to be in that position. Usually that first round up match maybe you get someone with a little less experience that might have snuck his way into the tournament and never played the event before. But obviously Ernie has a huge amount of experience. He's won a multiple of world match plays. And he's going to be a tough opponent. But there's no easy opponents this week. But certainly to start off he's going to be a tough one to try and beat. Q. As you've gotten older, have you changed the way you prep for Majors? And if so, how so? Are you more conscious of events leading into Majors? LUKE DONALD: Well, I've tried every different kind of scenario in terms of schedule, whether it be playing a couple of weeks before, whether it be taking three weeks off. I've tried it all. The only real sure way of playing well is to go there and play well. I haven't really found the right strategy obviously yet. I think my mindset has changed a little bit going into Majors. I feel like some events I use to try and improve in my golf, a little bit like Abu Dhabi, a little bit like last week. I'm working on things. And sometimes the result isn't that important. But the fact of going through certain things and improving doesn't necessarily mean it's going to relate to a better score at that point. But obviously when you get to the majors then you want to be just not thinking about anything. You want to be feeling very comfortable, not working on anything. You just want to go there and play and have less thoughts. And that's probably something I haven't done that well in the past. Maybe I've gone there searching for things rather than just playing. But in the last couple of years I'm starting to, in that way, prepare a little bit better. Q. Just curious whether a plan at 3,000 feet prompts any changes, or if you've played any higher elevation courses and how you've done, what adjustments you've had to make? LUKE DONALD: Well, there's obviously quite a few calculations we have to do, John and I, depending on the temperature. The ball is flying, the last couple of days, farther. I think when it gets warmer, which it's meant to and the adrenalin kicks in, it's close to 10 percent. We're kind of working in meters, which is a little bit of an adjustment. You take the sum of the elevations and the 10 percent difference, suddenly 250 yards you're hitting a 4‑iron, when usually that's a pretty good 3‑wood for me. It takes a little bit of getting used to. John and I have done a pretty good job in the last couple of years. Q. So after the year that you had last year, give us some insight, if you can, why you would keep working on that swing? You got to the point where you won everything you won last year, you won both Money Titles, and still you work on your swing. How can you make it any better than it was then? LUKE DONALD: Well, I think as golfers we're always searching to improve. I certainly wouldn't use the word change, I'm just trying to improve it little by little and get better. I think as golfers we're always searching for that, no matter who we are. There's a lot more for me to achieve in this game. There's still some parts of my game which I feel could certainly improve. And hopefully with that improvement it will give me better chances and more chances to be successful in the majors. Q. You carried the No.1 ranking a pretty long time now. Is there anything about carrying it that you learned that maybe you didn't expect or surprised you about being No.1? LUKE DONALD: Well, I've said this before: There's always a little bit more expectation and certainly more demand on my time. Juggling that it's tough at times. Saying no to some people that I probably wouldn't have had to have done in the past, that's a little bit tougher. But, again, I don't think about it too much. Again, my goal was never to be No.1. It was more of a process of everything coming together and good results getting me to that ranking. But certainly something I was very proud of. Something I am proud of. But it doesn't really change how I prepare and how I work, that remains the same. Q. Looking ahead, looking ahead and looking behind, I guess, when you were on the golf course at the end, the last hour or two at Augusta, were you able to track what was going on around you and the chaos or did you pull your visor down another inch and do the best you could, hope it stood up? LUKE DONALD: Well, there was a lot of noise that Sunday, obviously. The back nine there was a lot going on. There was multiple people having opportunities to win that tournament, and that's what makes Augusta exciting, especially last year's, birdies flying everywhere. You could hear the roars as a player. It was good to be a part of that and be in the mix and be one of those guys that had a chance. Obviously when I made double on 12, I was a little bit against the 8 ball. But I saw the board on 15, I think, they're hard to miss, the scoreboards are large and in prominent positions. I tend to try and find out where I am the last few holes to play. And obviously at that point obviously still had a chance. I didn't quite get it done, but it was fun to be a part of that Masters. Q. Out of all the things you did last year, where does this victory rank on your list? LUKE DONALD: Probably the most important one, whether I can rank it in terms of 1, 2, 3 or 4, I'm not sure. They're all very meaningful. But this was a big win for me in terms of the confidence I gained, not just from winning it, but the way I won it, the style in which I won it. And I think without winning here that maybe some of the other wins wouldn't have been possible. It really restored some of my confidence in myself and proved to myself that I could win again. Q. Do you take more pride in becoming No.1 or staying No.1 as long as you have? LUKE DONALD: Probably staying No.1. I've got a lot of great players on my heels. It takes a lot of consistency to get there but it takes an equal amount of consistency to stay there. Q. Can we go back to the final nine holes at Disney when you were on the threshold of doing something nobody had ever accomplished and you were really under the gun and yet you were able to perform. How satisfying was that? LUKE DONALD: Well, I've said, Disney was my more satisfying win, just because of that. If I hadn't gone on and birdied those next six holes, I wouldn't have had a chance to win both Money Titles. And that was really something in the forefront of my mind that I wanted to achieve. Obviously to do it under pressure on Sunday against where I had been battling with him all year. I was kind of determined to try and make something happen and fortunately it did. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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