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PGA CHAMPIONSHIPAugust 12, 2012David LynnKIAWAH ISLAND, SOUTH CAROLINA KELLY ELBIN: In his PGA Championship debut, David Lynn has made the most of it, finishing today with a 4‑under par 68 in the final round of the 94th PGA Championship. He is currently at 5‑under par, and it appears that he will finish as the runner‑up. As we stand right now, David, congratulations on the great round. Comments on your round today and such a strong finish in your first PGA, please. DAVID LYNN: Yeah. Same as yesterday, really. I felt good on the range. I've been feeling good with my game all week. Game felt good again on the range today, and it's surprising how settled I felt, really, going out. Got off to a good start, made a‑‑ hit it to about four feet at the 2nd and made my birdie, which obviously gets you off to a nice start. Then the next birdie came at 7, where I hit 4‑iron straight down the flag, just run through the green, two‑putted from about 20 feet. Birdied 11, which was laid up in two, pitched up to about 18 feet. 12 and 13, made bogey at 12, went left, second shot, left second shot at 13 but made a great save there. Then finishing last four holes, missed a great opportunity at 15 for birdie, two‑putted from just off the front at 16 for birdie, hit a great shot into 17 to, I don't know, 15 feet, and then hit a great second shot into the last to about eight, ten feet. You know, you come off a little bit disappointed, I missed a couple of putts in the last four holes, but you sort of sit here and you think, I'm lying second at the moment in the PGA, and you can't be disappointed with that. KELLY ELBIN: For the record, David birdied all the par‑5s today and seven of the eight par‑5s he played over the final two rounds. Q. This finish looks like puts you in the Masters. Is that on your mind at all towards the end? DAVID LYNN: I knew sort of top 10 finish would get you‑‑ somebody told me it would get me back here next year, but to be honest, somebody told me that last night, but I was thinking, well, let's just go out and play, and I can't control all that sort of stuff. I've just got to play as good as I can. And I've just done an interview for Sky, and he's just said it gets you in the Masters, which is just a dream come true, obviously. If that is the case then, is it top 4, so that's amazing, yeah. KELLY ELBIN: Also for the record, David's only other major championship appearance was in 2003 at the Open Championship in Sandwich. Did you make the cut there? DAVID LYNN: Yeah, I finished 50 odd, so I've never missed the cut in a major. Q. When you come into a tournament given that record that he's talking about, what kind of target did you get yourself coming into this week? Did you have a position in mind or something to do with your game particularly? DAVID LYNN: Well, to be honest with you, I've been feeling good at home. I had a great result in the French Open a couple weeks ago, and my game has been feeling like it's turned a corner a little bit. Practice, I've just had three weeks off, two weeks I had totally away from the golf clubs, and last week I started to practice again. Practice felt good. And then turned up this week and practice was good again. So it's more you just hope that you can take your practice game onto the course with you into a tournament, which I've pretty much managed to do this week. There was a few‑‑ I did struggle on a few of the left to right tee shots this week with my driver, but the fairways are generous enough that you can aim far enough left and sort of try and get it down there somewhere. Q. When the leader is getting so far ahead, even though you're getting chances down the stretch, are you at any point thinking, maybe I can sneak into this thing or are you just trying to finish well and see how high you can end up? DAVID LYNN: Yeah, I saw Rory at 11, and I thought, he's not going to mess up from there. It was just a case of playing for as good a position as I could and just basically trying to hit good shots and give myself chances down the last few, which I was really pleased I did. Q. Is this your first event in America? DAVID LYNN: It is, yeah. Q. Is there any reason you haven't played here before? Will this encourage you to come play more often here? DAVID LYNN: Well, I've never been exempt to play in anything in America, so that's the reason why I've never been over here. This is a good start. Q. I just noticed in your biographical stuff you had a lucky shilling, I guess, and then you had a Wedgewood thing. Is that something you've been carrying with you this week? DAVID LYNN: You're not going to believe this, but I went in my bag this morning to find my Wedgewood marker, and I'd lost it. I'd absolutely swear‑‑ and that shook me up a little bit. But then I thought, last time this happened, good things happened. I mean, that's absolutely true. I couldn't find it this morning. I think I've lost it again. It's funny you mention it. Q. I know you received an invite to this tournament. Can you sort of take us through that process? How long have you known you were going to be in this? DAVID LYNN: Well, I knew that the top 100 in the World Rankings qualifies, and I've missed out about four times by a couple of spots, and it was coming down to the D‑day again, and I thought, I'm going to miss out here again by one or two spots. And I chose not to play in Austria back home to try and sort of protect my ranking and managed to stay inside the top 100, and then the phone call came the Tuesday the week before, so I flew out on‑‑ I got the phone call on the Tuesday and then flew out on the Sunday. Q. You said that getting in Augusta is a dream. Can you talk a little bit more about that? It's a nice little parting gift here along with that runner‑up finish. DAVID LYNN: Yeah, obviously the Masters‑‑ well, all the four majors are the tournaments that as a kid you sit home and you watch. It's almost‑‑ seeing Augusta as many times as I have, it's like I know the place and I've never even been there. So actually go and get to experience it is going to be amazing and something I'm really going to look forward to. Q. Where does this experience as far as how you played this week, where you finished in the PGA Championship rank in your professional career? DAVID LYNN: I'd have to put my win as my best thing I've ever experienced and achieved, but for‑‑ I could argue for a different reason why this would be the best thing I've ever done, as well. Obviously winning your first‑ever tournament, whether it be in Europe, America, it's something that I've grown up dreaming of wanting to do, and I've achieved that. It was a long time ago now. But to come and perform the way I have this week in a major is still very special and is‑‑ it's a great achievement. It's not sunk in properly yet to be honest. KELLY ELBIN: David's one victory on the European Tour came at the 2004 KLM Open. Q. What Rory has been able to do this week and his only over‑par round was on the Friday, the most brutal day in PGA history, can you put into perspective what he's been able to do on this course that everybody else couldn't do? DAVID LYNN: Yeah, obviously he's playing fantastic. Everybody knows Rory is a great player, and he's shown it this week. It just has been, this week, a constant‑‑ you've constantly got to be switched on. It's crosswinds pretty much all week, as well, which for me, I don't like a left to right crosswind. I'm quite happy on a right to left one. There's just parts on the golf course where me as a player felt more comfortable than other parts on the golf course. Rory is obviously feeling at ease on the whole of the golf course. Yeah, I mean, he's‑‑ well, he's got a six‑shot lead at the moment still, I think, so he's playing great. That's good golf. Q. What would you say are the strengths and weaknesses of your game, and what did you do particularly well this week that maybe you haven't done quite as well except maybe when you won? DAVID LYNN: I tend to think that I do everything reasonably well. My putting gets very streaky this week. I've holed out nicely, which obviously keeps momentum going during rounds. I never really have a massive destructive shot, so obviously I can get it in play. I always find that I'm quite a solid iron player. So put me in the fairway, fairways are generous this week, so, you know, I've just played‑‑ I can't really say that this week I've done anything exceptionally well. Everything has just been performing very solidly. Q. I just wondered when you arrived here not having played here before and not having been in this tournament before, what were your impressions of the course? Did it hit you as something that would suit you particularly well, and were you nervous at all about the prospects? DAVID LYNN: Turning up for the first time, I was obviously‑‑ there's more excitement than nerves, about to play my first event in America, and I'm going to see a lot of faces that I've seen on TV, so that was good. And watching the '91 Ryder Cup here. It was always a place that intrigued me. I mean, visually from the air, it looks amazing, and it's not disappointing when I've turned up here. I have to say, it's very‑‑ with the wind, it probably is a little bit European. I noticed that I think there was eight players in the top 10 going into today's round were European. It just showed you it's probably got a little bit of a European feel to it. The only thing I've struggled with this week is the humidity. I've been wearing a rain glove because my hands get quite sweaty. It has been quite hot and humid. But it's lived up to its expectations for me. I've loved the golf course, and the crowds has been fantastic, everything has been great. Q. With this result, is this going to give you incentive now to go and play in the U.S. Open and the British Open because you're notorious for not wanting to qualify for both of those majors? DAVID LYNN: Well, you say I'm notorious for it. I actually am a bit stubborn sometimes, and I believe if you don't qualify to play in a tournament outright that you shouldn't be playing in it, and that's something that I've always believed, plus the qualifying is at quite an awkward point in the year when we've got big tournaments going on. So I mean, hopefully this will open up the gates for me to get in automatically. I don't know if it sounds daft to you, but I think if I go to a 36‑hole qualifier to qualify for an event, I feel like I half don't belong there, whereas this week I felt that I'm in the top 100 in the world, and that's the criteria for getting in, so I belong here. KELLY ELBIN: David Lynn, welcome to America. Great playing at the 94th PGA Championship. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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