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MASTERS TOURNAMENTApril 11, 2013Sergio GarciaAUGUSTA, GEORGIA THE MODERATOR: Good afternoon, everyone, it's a pleasure to welcome Sergio GarcÃÂa here this afternoon. It's his 15th Masters appearance. He had six birdies today and finished with a 66. Sergio, congratulations on your round. SERGIO GARCIA: Thank you very much. THE MODERATOR: We'll open it up to questions. Q. Thought you hated it here (laughter). SERGIO GARCIA: No, I mean, well, obviously it's obviously not my favorite, my most favorite place, but you know, we try to enjoy it as much as we can each time we come here. Sometimes it comes out better than others, but today it was one of those good days. And you know, let's enjoy it while it lasts. Q. Did it help you that you had maybe that lower expectation coming here? SERGIO GARCIA: Lower expectation, maybe that's what you say. Every time I tee off in a tournament, my goal is to play the best I can and have a chance at winning. So it doesn't change this week. Like I said, today was a nice day. It was one of those days that you really, really enjoy, and, you know, hopefully I'll have three more of those and we'll see what happens on Sunday night. Q. Did you play solidly all the way around? SERGIO GARCIA: I played extremely well the first ten holes and then I struggled with a couple tee shots here and there the last six or seven holes. But I managed to make two really good par saves. So overall, I mean, the first‑‑ what I'm going to try to take into my pillow tonight, it's the first ten holes. I think it's without a doubt, I feel like it's the best ten holes I've played at the Masters. Even though scoring‑wise maybe it wasn't, but the way I hit the ball and the amount of birdie chances that I gave myself, it was‑‑ it meant a lot. Q. Being this isn't your most favorite place, what is the specific challenge here to you? SERGIO GARCIA: Well, it's like everybody else's. We all know that the Masters now is not only‑‑ it used to be shots to the green and around the green and on the green. Now, you also have to drive the ball very, very well if you want to score well. Some of the fairways are really, really tight. Some of the doglegs, you can't get through them anymore. So it's just difficult. The good thing about it is that if you play well, you can score. But if you're a little bit off, you know, you can struggle quite a bit. So it's a very thin line. Q. Do you regret saying what you did here before; that you feel like you're only playing for second or third place? SERGIO GARCIA: Well, I mean, those were my words. But no, I think that at the end of the day, we go through moments, tough moments, and frustrated moments or frustrating moments, and I know it was one of them. Obviously maybe I didn't say it the right way because it was one of those frustrating moments. What I felt is that, you know, I definitely kind of shoot myself out of the tournament last year and that's what I did on that Saturday. So I wasn't wrong there. But like I said before, every time I tee it off, I try to play as well as I can, hope that my best that week is really, really good, and if I manage to do that, I will have a chance at winning. If my best is not that good, then, you know, I'll struggle a little bit. Today my best was pretty good, and I'm looking forward to doing the same thing the next three days. It will be really nice. Q. Why did you jump out of the tree at Bay Hill, did you hurt yourself at all, and do you know if they have rules about jumping out of trees at Augusta? SERGIO GARCIA: Well, one thing is for sure, if I hit on top of a tree here, there's no chance of getting to that hole (laughter) because the branches are 60 feet high. So why did I jump out of the tree? Because, you know, I guess I was kind of tired‑‑ I couldn't really believe where the ball finished. And it didn't feel like it was that high, that jump. I guess. Q. It was higher than Mickelson‑‑ oh, never mind. SERGIO GARCIA: (Laughing). But he was jumping from the ground. Q. When you put your head on the pillow tonight, will you be thinking that you had a great round with so many birdies on the front nine, or because you kept your round together on the back nine. SERGIO GARCIA: Well, obviously, like I said, the first ten holes for me, it showed me a lot because of how well I hit every single shot. I mean, if‑‑ to tell you the truth, if I manage to make a couple of the putts that kind of stayed around the lip, I could have been probably 7‑ or 8‑under par through ten. It was that good. And it wasn't like I was hitting pitching wedge every single time. I was hitting 4‑irons and 5‑irons and 6‑irons, so it wasn't that easy. Obviously the last eight holes mean a lot that I kept my composure, even though I didn't hit it as well as I did the first ten holes, but I made a great save on 11 after driving in the trees with a sand wedge for my third. Then I made another great save on 17 after hitting a bad tee shot, and I made a nice birdie on 15. So you know, that's what I kind of tried to mean. Q. You've always seemed like a confident player, outwardly at least, and you've never during this stretch of your career felt unconfident or had a confidence problem, do you feel like? SERGIO GARCIA: Well, we go through times, but not only myself, everybody, even Tiger has gone through that stretch where he was struggling. Obviously he wasn't feeling as comfortable and he wasn't as confident. And Rory just kind of went through it a little bit, too. It looks like he's starting to play a little bit better. We all go through those moments. The beauty and the bad thing about this game is that, that it can have such highs and such lows, because it's a lot more mental than some of the other games. So you know, the most important thing is to make sure that you get through those nicely and learn from them. Q. Wondering if I can ask you your thoughts, maybe you're not aware of it, the 14‑year‑old from China, 1‑over par in his first round at the Masters. I don't know if you saw him today, I'm guessing you didn't. But maybe you saw him during the week; what are your thoughts on someone at that age doing this? SERGIO GARCIA: I didn't actually see him, no. It was funny because we were just talking on the way here in the cart, Adam Scott and I were walking down 15, and obviously he was coming down 17 and he was 2‑over. We were talking about it, you know, 14 years old and 2‑over at the Masters. It's very impressive. You know, he ended up birdieing the last and shooting 1‑over. There's no doubt that the conditions were pretty good, but you still have to do it. And we were talking about it, joking a little bit, if we would have been here 14 years old, we would have been shaking. It happened to me at 16 when I played the British Open and I thought I was going to miss it on that first tee shot, so I can't imagine how he must have felt. Q. I remember maybe ten years ago when you were here, you were more enthusiastic; at what point do you think this tournament changed for you? I think you were welcoming in the beginning. SERGIO GARCIA: No, no, don't get me wrong, I still welcome it, there's no doubt. It's very difficult to play the Masters and I've been fortunate to be able to do it for some years now. Sometimes I do feel like there is such a thing as being too‑‑ you know, too hyper about something. You've still got to keep calm. I've obviously changed as a player. I'm not the same way I was when I was 19. I still get very excited about playing the game and every single week and trying to win tournaments. But it's obviously not the same feeling that when I was 19, 20 or 21. But that's kind of normal. Q. But it's not like a particular time when they lengthened it, is that what you didn't like so much? SERGIO GARCIA: No, I don't think so. Everybody does what they feel like they have to. Obviously the Members here at Augusta have done what they felt like it was right to do for the course, and the only thing we can do is come here, play the best we can and, you know, try to win it. That's all we can do. Q. So you're more realistic? SERGIO GARCIA: Am I more realistic? Q. You're no longer the 19‑year‑old kid jumping around, you're more businesslike about it? SERGIO GARCIA: No, that's not what I'm saying. I'm not saying I wasn't realistic when I was 19. But obviously as you get older, you mature a little bit more. I'm sure it happened to you, too (laughter), so you know what I kind of mean. THE MODERATOR: Thank you, Sergio, great round today. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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