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THE MEMORIAL TOURNAMENT PRESENTED BY NATIONWIDE INSURANCEMay 28, 2013Lee WestwoodDUBLIN, OHIO DOUG MILNE: We'd like to welcome Lee Westwood to the interview room here at the Memorial. Lee, thanks for joining us for a few minutes. Making your second start here, your first in ten years. And in addition to that coming off four consecutive top‑10s on the PGA Tour. Just a few opening comments on being back here at Muirfield. LEE WESTWOOD: It's nice to be back. I can't really remember that much about the golf course. I think it changes a lot‑‑ probably changed a lot over the years, as well. I'm looking forward to it this week. Obviously with Jack's name associated with the Tour, it's obviously a very prestigious one to win and that's why it attracts such a good field. I'm playing pretty consistently. Four top‑10s on the PGA Tour, and top‑10 last week in Europe. Looking forward to this week, and hopefully just keep playing as I am, and hopefully get in contention and finish it off. Q. What's the hardest part of this going from one course and playing here back to back? LEE WESTWOOD: It will probably be the case of getting used to the pace of the greens. Last week they were quite slow compared to the players. The players were quite fast compared to Quail Hollow the week before. The time change is not that much of an issue, only five hours. Tomorrow I'll be over the jet lag. And it's getting used to the speed of the greens again of the. Q. How long does what happened in the final round stay with you? LEE WESTWOOD: Not long, gone now. Only lasts about three beers (laughter). Q. I hadn't paid that close attention to your schedule this far, but with your new living arrangements, etcetera, etcetera, how much are you packaging both Tours in terms of‑‑ I guess last week was certainly an exception, but do you find yourself doing things in bunches, and is that different for you? LEE WESTWOOD: No, I've always done it in bunches, but I'm doing it from this side of the Atlantic now. If last week hadn't happened, I wouldn't have gone. I would have played Texas or whatever, if it was a regular event. But obviously with the PGA, I wanted to support that event. And it's the European Tour's flagship event. So it would have been wrong to have missed it. And then I'm going back there in a few weeks time for the French Open and then a week off and then The Open Championship. That's the other block I'm playing over there. Middle week, visit family and friends, and do a bit of practice for The Open probably. And then the rest of the year over here, until the end of the year when I'll do a little bit in Asia. Q. How much? LEE WESTWOOD: I probably play four in a row, BMW, Turkey and Dubai and then call it a day, probably for the year. Q. What prompted‑‑ can you talk about how your diet has changed? LEE WESTWOOD: Probably happened about six or seven years ago now. Just didn't feel as fit as I could be and as strong as I ought to be. I looked around and everybody was in pretty good shape, physically quite well and strong. And the golf course is getting longer, rough is getting thicker. So I was getting older (laughter) seemed like a sensible thing to do, just for the immediate future and for the year longevity. So I had to pay attention to my diet for a little while and just go in the gym a little bit more often. Q. Did you give up junk food? LEE WESTWOOD: I'm not a massive eater of junk food. It's just quantity that I struggle with (laughter). I basically don't know when to stop. So, you know, just reining it in a bit. I have times when I go and eat too much again, but I think everybody is like that. Q. Have you seen the golf course and how different is from the last time? LEE WESTWOOD: I haven't, no, I only got in at 6:00 last night. I'm going to have nine holes today and play tomorrow. Q. As someone of your youth, I mean that seriously in this context, how much do you know about Ben Hogan? LEE WESTWOOD: Not a lot, really. Q. What do you think about when you think of Ben Hogan? LEE WESTWOOD: A swing that everybody wants to emulate and a white cap. Q. His name will come into view in a couple of weeks, obviously. I'm sure you've seen that‑‑ LEE WESTWOOD: I've seen that photo, yeah. Q. Anything else you think of that shot, does it make you think of anything? LEE WESTWOOD:  Not really, no. I don't even know what hole it's on. Q. 18? LEE WESTWOOD: Okay. Q. 1‑iron? LEE WESTWOOD: Right. Q. Last 1‑iron you hit was‑‑ LEE WESTWOOD: I can't remember when I had a 1‑iron last. Could have been 20 years ago. I'm not sure I've got a 2‑iron. Somewhere, but‑‑ Q. Do you know much about his story of the accident? LEE WESTWOOD: I know he had a car accident and obviously he was badly injured and came back from that. But, no, not really. I know about Carnoustie and Hogan's Alley up there on 6. I know he liked Riviera. There's a statute of him there on the putting green. But I really don't know too much. Q. The Masters and U.S. Open and then he had to go qualify for The Open? LEE WESTWOOD: Was that at Carnoustie? Q. Yes. LEE WESTWOOD: Yeah. Q. How active are you on social media, does it help yourself or is it a distraction for athletes? LEE WESTWOOD: I do a little bit and then I have times when I stay away from it. There's a famous quote about opinions, unfortunately there's a lot of people on Twitter. And a lot of them are misinformed or uneducated opinions, so I try to ignore and not pay too much attention to a lot of it. Q. Have you been to Merion? LEE WESTWOOD: No, not yet, no. Q. Are you going to play it? LEE WESTWOOD: I may drop down next week for a day, get a game plan together. Q. Can you talk about how you put a game plan together on a course that's so short and a place you've never been to before, before a Major championship? LEE WESTWOOD: Well, I think it's going to be‑‑ there's going to be some holes where it's just obvious how to play it. You probably hit it into a spot, the widest area or to leave the ideal distance. There will be certain holes where they'll tempt you into going for it, maybe moving the tees around and make it a drivable par‑4. They like to do that now where you move the tees around and make par‑4s drivable. And then there will be par‑3s that will say 250 on the card and they'll move the tees around on that. I probably won't change clubs too much, you know, because occasionally I do carry a 2‑iron, but I think I'll probably carry a utility club. And then just get an idea of what it's like around the greens. The rough we're going to have to chip out of, just what I can do to practice like that. Q. Why did you want to make this a part of your calendar, this particular event? What was it about wanting to make sure you were here for this? LEE WESTWOOD: I enjoyed it when I played it last, in 2003. I've always watched it on TV. Jack Nicklaus is involved and obviously is a draw for a lot of the players. It's one of those‑‑ they say it's a bit higher than the rest, it's one to win on the PGA Tour. Q. You've had kind of a peculiar year, almost working backwards‑‑ Tiger, Sergio a big dispute on anchoring and lawyers being retained. A guy who was cleared of the violation and sued the Tour, etcetera, etcetera. I'm curious from a player's standpoint, how do you look at things like that? It seems like a fairly contentious year, I think, for the media, for the public. I'd be curious how a player looks at it? LEE WESTWOOD: I haven't been involved in really any of that (laughter), it's been quite easy for me to ignore it, and let the powers that be go on with it, which is the way I like it. I've got my opinions, but I'm not really bothered about sharing it with anybody, stirring up what needs to be stirred up. It's been quite a controversial year for golf. Q. Is that healthy for golf? LEE WESTWOOD: They say even bad news or any news is good news, publicity. But some of it's not, obviously. So, you know, it's a weird one. I think people have said things that they shouldn't have said and now I think people have sort of run with that to try to get a story out of as long as possible. But it should be about playing golf out here really. Q. Do you get a sense in the locker rooms or such of football that they talk about golf the way you guys talk about football and other sports? LEE WESTWOOD: Can you run that one by me again? Q. I was afraid you'd say that. As much as you guys talk about football or some of our guys talk about football or basketball, do you get a sense of your footballers in their time together talk about golf the way you guys talk about them in terms of‑‑ LEE WESTWOOD: I don't know whether they're talking about it, but most of the athletes that I know that play other sports, they're talking about golf all the time. Whether they're talking about that, I don't know, I'm not privy to that conversation. But certainly it's one of the sports that other athletes are able to do and not get injured. So I assume they're talking about it in the locker rooms and stuff like that. Q. Majors and things like that, but who is going to win, who is favored, such and such. That's good for the sport? LEE WESTWOOD: Yeah. It's great for the sport. I like to see‑‑ and play with the people from other sports to get a feel for what they go through, the way they feel about their sports and how it relates to golf, as well. It's quite interesting at times. Q. You grew up, you wanted to be a champion golfer, you don't really know all that that entails. You just see winning trophies and money and becoming famous. When it actually happens and all of a sudden you have all this money and these financial opportunities, how difficult is that to manage or are you comfortable, you just let other people manage it? What's your, I guess, how is‑‑ what is your interaction like with your outside business affairs? LEE WESTWOOD: Well, you should have people or an infrastructure in place to take care of that. Basically when I started playing golf and got good at golf, I became good at getting a small white ball into a little hole. It doesn't make me an expert at anything else. So the other parts of my life I like to leave to experts in those fields. So that's basically, I think, what you should do. Q. Do you have a lot of people in your ears until they're clear that you have this plan and you're sticking to it and you're not going to be swayed by other voices or inputs? LEE WESTWOOD: Yeah, I think, but you have to sift out what's right for you. It's very easy to listen to too many opinions. And the opinion that really counts is your own. You're never going to have conviction‑‑ even if somebody else is right, you're never going to have conviction if you don't think it's right. Q. What's been the biggest adjustment either on or off the course in switching Tours? LEE WESTWOOD: There hasn't really been a massive adjustment to make. I think because I've traveled the world a lot and sort of been away from home for long periods of time, it's not been a massive change for me. I think to my wife and children it's probably been an adjustment for them, but for me there's been no adjustment. It's made my life way easier. Playing and not having jet lag or as much jet lag, and being able to come home on Sunday night and not come out until Tuesday morning. There's really not been an adjustment for me to make. Q. What's the biggest factor to switch? LEE WESTWOOD: Partly that, being able to see my family more and get rid of the jet lag or large parts of it. I was playing predominantly over here. So it made sense to move over here. The weather in England was getting me down a lot‑‑ don't laugh‑‑ and with the weather in England not being good in the winter, going home and coming out the following season and feeling like I couldn't put the practice in that I needed to, coming out rusty. And not being match fit, coming straight out and contending. Q. A Tiger, nonSergio question‑‑ he's been defending champion, won here five times, won four times this year. Is there a sense among players that he could be on the verge of a crazy run like he's done in the past? LEE WESTWOOD: I think he's on one, isn't he? I don't think he's on the verge of it, I think he's in one. How many tournaments has he played this year? He's won more than 50 percent. No, he's obviously playing very well at the moment and whenever he tees it up, you're going to expect he's going to win, which is how it was ten years ago. Q. Lee, you had mentioned you hadn't played here in about ten years, you don't remember much about the course. Have you reached out to any of the players about holes or are you relying mostly on yourself or your caddie to get a game plan this week? LEE WESTWOOD: No, I'll do it myself. I've seen it change quite considerably since I played it. Otherwise I think the golf course will play fairly similar. I'll have a look at it tomorrow and then the Pro Am should be enough really. Q. What kind of interests have your kids taken up differently from having moved here? LEE WESTWOOD: They're a lot more outdoors. Playing basketball a lot more, we never played it in England. But American football. I think his rugby background has given him a good base to that. They used to get stuck on it, but now they get pads on, so he thinks he's all right. And he's playing a lot more golf. And Poppy is being Poppy, bossing everybody around, working on her tan. No, she's not working on her tan. They swim a lot more outdoors, and spend a lot more time outdoors. Q. When you've had the kind of sustained success you've had in your career, do you have a feeling that it's inevitable that at some point a Major will happen for you or is there a feeling that they're so difficult to win it takes something special or if you're a really good player for a long time it will just eventually happen? LEE WESTWOOD:  I don't think it's inevitable, and I don't think it's one of these things you can force. You've just got to keep working on the things that are letting you down really. I've been in contention a lot of times and come close. And there are certain things that have let me down, and then different things. So you just have to analyze that and then work on your weaknesses to bring them up to‑‑ I think obviously one of my Major weaknesses was my short game, but now that's looking really solid. And I feel like I can contend more in Major championships. You just keep working towards that. And if you're good enough and you do the right things at the right time then you win one. Q. I'm curious about this, but when you look at a number of players who have won a Major but really haven't done many other great things over the course of their career, how do you balance the real value of winning Majors with a body of work over a career? This kind of came up when Monty got into the Hall of Fame with 8 orders of merits and how many victories and Ryder Cups, etcetera, which was really a nice career, but no Major. Compared with someone who it was his week, but doesn't really have the body of work. That in mind, what is the real value of the Major? LEE WESTWOOD:  I don't know. It's not something I've thought about, really. I think a great career has both, has multiple wins and Major wins or a Major win‑‑ obviously that would be a good career. I suppose if I won a Major championship now, would it make my career a great career? I don't know. That's for other people to decide. But I've never really thought about it too much. I'll give it serious thought when it happens. Way to deep for me, now. DOUG MILNE: Lee, we appreciate your time. Best of luck. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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