DORAL-RYDER OPEN

March 3, 1997

Nick Faldo

NICK FALDO: It's very nice, lovely job; a lot of bunkers. It's just basically squeezed everything in and added a few contours to the greens, but it looks really nice, the bunkers are in nice shape.

NICK FALDO: Well, I think one area is -- it's narrow. But, if you're driving well, then you're going to be on the fairways and it could be some new tighter pins. I think there's a few -- the hardest is they shaved off some of the edges on the greens. They fall back into the water. So, I think that will be -- that can make you play a little bit more smarter, more defensive or whatever, or you've got to -- you can't come up short examine - it's going to stay there. It will come back into the water. So, who knows? It's tough to tell. If the weather is perfect, but I'm sure it's going to make a shot or two different. A shot or two a day is a lot. That could be 4 to 8 shots in the week. So, I'm sure it's going to make a difference in the score by the end of the week.

NICK FALDO: I'd like to think I can do that, yeah. Go out and see if I can play the same game physically and mentally this week and see how strong everything is.

NICK FALDO: I came straight away on Sunday when we finished. So to get over jet lag, and the climate is different, but this is not too hot yet. We shall see.

NICK FALDO: I haven't seen that one yet. I've only done the front 9.

NICK FALDO: 4 is --

NICK FALDO: No -- well, I don't know. The difficulty there now is you can't go long right, because you roll off down into the water, so -- but I always thought that left-hand trap was very tough, it was a deep pot bunker, and if you went in there, it was a tough lie, tough to get up-and-down. So I think he's made that left side easier and made the right side harder. I think you probably have to play that hole a little more defensive. You can't go long, long right, otherwise you're in the water now.

NICK FALDO: Same thing, now you've got -- if they put the pins long and you're pitching past it, if it comes back, it's going to keep coming back, so that's the -- I think that's where it can add a -- it is a mental thing to make, isn't there? How aggressive you can be to land right in the number.

NICK FALDO: Yeah, I found the ball going -- well, I think because we were pretty close to the coast, last week the ball was going very short. I think you get a lot of spin because it was so tight and such a hard turf. I thought that was a bit tough last week. We were hitting one club more than I normally hit, but now I can't go long. So, that was quite a battle and that's why I was pleased on Sunday, because I had made a go of it. If I could be pin-high today, get it up there, be aggressive, I thought that would be really good for me, so I was pleased that I did that.

NICK FALDO: Yeah, I thought it would fly longer here.

NICK FALDO: Yeah, I'm doing well. I've got some good projects coming on. I do a lot of projects with IMG in Asia. And I just got a very big project in Portugal, 36 holes there. And, then with Marriott, I'm doing one in Mallorca with Marriott and there's future sites in America with Marriott.

NICK FALDO: I just enjoy the crazy bit, a little artistic bit comes out in me. It's great to go out and you want to create something and you want to do the best you possibly can, try and create some nice looking holes and some challenging golf courses.

NICK FALDO: I think it's got to be creative to both, because you enjoy -- I feed off good golf courses and enjoy the subtlety of the slopes and where you have to position the ball. And the TOUR here always goes for the four best pins on the green. So, that sort of keeps you awake. You have to be paying attention to where you hit it, otherwise it willy-nilly fire it in 20 feet and you're in a mess.

NICK FALDO: Steve Smyers in Portugal.

NICK FALDO: Yeah, he does good work.

NICK FALDO: And so things on that side are going well for me. I don't want too much work, but I enjoy that.

NICK FALDO: I like the McKenzie style bunkering, obviously George Thomas, last week, is a lovely style golf course. I want to build golf courses -- I admire last week, because one bunker is key to the whole hole. It's different in Florida, because it's dead flat. You have to create -- but that's the skill of putting one bunker and the contours of the green where you've got to drive down the left-hand side of the fairway; if you drive down the right-hand side, you're not quite in the right place. And, I think that is the skill of making it -- really getting the most out of a golf course. Yes, you see 60 yards of fairway, but you know you need to be left half, right half, to get the best angle in.

NICK FALDO: I think possibly it might have started for me at the 6. I bogeyed 5. I had a really good -- I wasn't perturbed by that because I had a good second shot. And to make a birdie down 6, that is a tough one. The next key would have been the par hole on 8, because I hit -- that pin right there, it was such an easy pitch and I messed it up and then got away with it. So, that was key. And the tee shot really on 12 was the next key one. And then the 2-iron on 13. That was the -- that sort of span was really -- and even the 4-iron I hit down 15, that was still key, because I could do anything from up there on top of the hill.

NICK FALDO: Yeah, I think the most obvious we saw was he started regripping the club a few extra times, so he was over the ball a lot longer than normal.

NICK FALDO: Well, The Masters was great and the rest of the year wasn't as good as I'd have liked, but -- the British Open was close. It's funny, putting it all together, I didn't play well -- I hit a lot of tees to greens at the U.S. Open, but I'm never close enough to the pin. And the opposite, Oakland Hills, the putter wasn't quite as good. But it's getting the blend. And it was -- after Augusta it was -- it's still a great year, but it was disappointing that I couldn't do better. But, it's still a great year.

NICK FALDO: You never think that with golf. You never think that with golf. That's the beauty or the damnation of it. You can be playing lousy and win two weeks, and win two tournaments, you can win two tournaments, two weeks later you think you can't hit your hat. That is the beauty of golf. So you never -- I never plan ahead more than tomorrow on how well I'm playing.

NICK FALDO: There's only one now. I'm staking my claim to the other one after last week.

NICK FALDO: Who's lobbying?

NICK FALDO: They've got Ken to lobby against, so it might be more than lobbying. They might need a grenade.

NICK FALDO: I would, because I like to assume I've got one of them now. And I'd also like to think -- I've only given myself six tournaments to make the team. So -- six more. So, it's bad to be using a pick on somebody you assume is going to be on the team. So I think you've wasted the pick on me, which that's what -- our argument was last time, but Ken said why change it. I don't know if they can suddenly change the rules, change the goal post halfway through the year.

NICK FALDO: They have?

NICK FALDO: Just the numbers?

NICK FALDO: Oh, that's pretty good. That should be close. I could get close to that, then, in theory. I'm still pushed to get to 11.

NICK FALDO: A couple of extra tournaments is hard work. You bust your buns from -- that's what I'm trying to avoid is dashing around, just to be -- it makes life difficult just dashing around just to get your name on a sheet of paper.

NICK FALDO: That would be good, very good I would have thought. Yeah, I would have thought -- it has definitely softening, Europeans definitely softened on that one. I think that's advantageous to some guys along the way, yeah.

NICK FALDO: Yeah, very much, I think you want to play -- you definitely want to be playing the team, but you can't go flying backwards and forwards to please everybody. It's a lot further across there than you think. To do it properly means you've got to take a chunk out of this TOUR, and it doesn't work, because I'm trying to concentrate my main season from sort of now, February -- January through to August. September is your main season. You can't suddenly pick up a month and -- there's just not enough weeks. That's why I said, I'm playing in America and that's it. If I play well in America then I will -- if I'm playing well, I should be on the team.

NICK FALDO: Yeah, sure. I mean, I think -- but I'd like to think that -- Ryder Cup is always -- you always call it Ryder Cup here, every odd year. So, it's always been a priority making the team, but now I'd like to think I've got my record, to help get me the last little leg that I need.

NICK FALDO: I still feel I've got another -- who knows what more I'm going to achieve. I still feel that I've got a good -- I figure I have another five years to really go at it as hard as I can. We'll see what happens.

NICK FALDO: Yeah, yeah, of course. If I had a choice, that is the one I'm trying to prepare for, make sure I've got -- I'm really strong for that one.

NICK FALDO: Worldwide? Probably about 23, 24, something like that.

NICK FALDO: Here? It would be about 15, 16.

NICK FALDO: World Series, yes.

NICK FALDO: Well, I said now I'm leading. Now the pressure is all on me, now it's mine to lose. And that was what -- that was an incredible rush of pressure.

NICK FALDO: I don't know, you just -- I think you just sense that (indicating), all the attention is just pointing at you. So that's why I was pleased the way I finished. I still finished 3-under for the last six holes. I went forward, which was great. That was the key thing to that was I got in that position and I kept going forward.

NICK FALDO: Yeah, in a perversive sort of way. I think he would stop and look around and say this is what it's all about. That's what you practice hard for, to put yourself in that position. It takes a long time to learn how to enjoy it, sort of -- but that's what you could say I'm doing it for. You want to put yourself in that position just to see what you can do.

NICK FALDO: Yeah, I think that's what helps me. I still have my swing keys. And right back from standing at the last hole at Muirfield in '87, I think that's what helped me. When the pressure is really, there it is, you can go back to -- I've been doing this the last 72 holes, rotate, set --

NICK FALDO: Oh, my God, it gets rid of everything, and I can just stay with what I've been doing for -- so I feel that is what really has worked for me.

NICK FALDO: Benefit has been very -- he's had that wonderful elusive -- but the first time I ever watched him golf, one of those world of golf things with Snead in Houston when they said it was the most perfect round of golf.

NICK FALDO: My friend and I -- I think he videoed it off that, so you imagine the quality was horrendous, it was like watching it through a snow storm and hail storm. That was the first time I ever watched that, took note of, and I've always, unfortunately, never seen him hit a shot live. And I've watched -- I've got a few videos, and what have you, where people -- actually some private videos where people have filmed him practicing.

NICK FALDO: I haven't got that one yet.

NICK FALDO: Very rarely.

NICK FALDO: Very rarely. I wouldn't say I've got an decent library of my wins.

NICK FALDO: Yeah, he's got -- we're very reserved, but he lets little bits out; you sort of grasp on just a few words and what have you.

NICK FALDO: Yeah, I can sort of -- I could figure where he was coming from.

NICK FALDO: I don't know about less pressure. It can't change the pressure, because you go out and do your own thing when you play a golf tournament anyway. You've got to look after yourself. And I haven't played against him.

NICK FALDO: It is. It has. It has made a major impact in golf. I think they need to keep their reins on it, because the media attention is getting too much, as he found on the golf course last week. So, I think we're probably going to have to start making some new rules, where the photographers and where everybody can go. It's just too much commotion going on. It's not golf. (Laughter).

NICK FALDO: Jazzed up? Bring the band?

NICK FALDO: Yeah, I'll bring the harmonica.

Yeah, sure, you're going to have to be, because there's going to be a lot of razzmatazz. You're not going to be able to have a little battle for 18 holes. It's going to be the full show, lights and action and everything. So you're going to have to be switched on to it.

NICK FALDO: Yeah, you have to have -- you have to be mentally very strong, because there's a lot going on, I imagine. You want to keep on your own game and there's nothing worse than a lot of commotion going on.

NICK FALDO: Golfing showbiz, yeah.

NICK FALDO: I wouldn't say show business. But, I think at times you try to be a little bit of an entertainer. You've got to be an entertainer. At times you've got to feel that your golf entertains the public, and times you feel like you have opportunities that come along to have a bit of feedback with them. And you can bounce off things.

NICK FALDO: I'm not. I'm not Ben Hogan as in Ben and his mental powers that he had. And I'm not Ben Hogan in the golfing powers. So I couldn't say I've modeled -- there's little similarities. Certainly, I haven't modeled myself on him.

NICK FALDO: That's what I was saying. You have to have strong mental powers and just strong powers to carry on playing how you want to play, rather than being caught into it, roped into doing something you don't want to. You don't want to be a different person than you are, because you're playing with him. You want to be exactly the same.

NICK FALDO: Play. Put the left shoe on your left foot and put the right shoe on the right foot. That would be enough. I don't think I would be advising anybody.

NICK FALDO: It's pretty quiet.

NICK FALDO: I don't know and I couldn't care less.

NICK FALDO: Yeah, well, they're being back again, for this next part of the story.

NICK FALDO: British press, yeah. There's only one.

NICK FALDO: No, we've got to go through the first bit before the wedding. You have to go through the divorce first before the wedding. That's the next -- not before, because it's not going to happen before. So, it's divorce next and then we will see what happens next.

NICK FALDO: Where are you coming from? I'm not talking one word about that.

NICK FALDO: No answer. No comment. Sorry.

NICK FALDO: Catching trout. No, I had a wonderful trip. I managed to go through New Zealand on the way to Australia and had a great time. We went down to Queenstown in the South Island and choppered out. We were out in the mountains.

NICK FALDO: No. This guy took us in, and it was a day's walk to get back. It was wonderful. It was the mountains either side of you, stream coming down, fishing guides and what have you. So, we had a good laugh. And we fished until we dropped. We hiked up this river and fished for like, whatever, it was eight hours of fishing, with a 15-minute lunch break. And it was wonderful. It was just great to be out. I felt very privileged to be miles away from anything. There was nobody around. It wasn't like suddenly a party of sightseers were going to come down. You were out there.

NICK FALDO: I'd like to do -- I fish back in England quite seriously, and hopefully I'll try and do something later in the year in Montana or somewhere. That would be nice if I get two trips a year.

NICK FALDO: I might try to get some fishing before that. Actually, I am. I'm going to Vancouver for that Skins Game. And that's got salmon a mile down the road. So that's the reason why I'm there.

NICK FALDO: You chuck your line out and you reel it in and you sit -- the great thing on the TV, they take the fish out and turn to the camera: "Here we are at so and so river," and this poor fish is going "hello, can I go back in the water?" They talk to the camera for two minutes, and the poor bastard is just sitting there. "I'm going put it back in" and the fish is going - (indicating) (laughter) they finally put it back in. The fish goes, "geez." You can't believe it. They stand and have a chat and this poor fishing is just taking it. Cruelty, cruelty. No, it doesn't look too technical.

NICK FALDO: I'm trying to catch it the hard way.

NICK FALDO: Is it? Yeah, trout fishing is not luck, that's why it's fun.

LEE PATTERSON: Anything else? Appreciate your time.