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VOLVO GOLF CHAMPIONSJanuary 10, 2014Joost LuitenDURBAN, SOUTH AFRICA STEVE TODD: Thanks for joining us. It's quite an eventful day out there for you, but if you could start with the obvious highlight, the 10th hole, which I believe is the first albatross of your career. JOOST LUITEN: Yeah, my first albatross. It was playing downwind, the hole. I hit a good drive middle of the fairway,227 meters left. Hit a 4‑iron and basically went straight at it, just pitched exactly where I wanted, just front of the green, and then hopefully releases up the slope and that's what it did. It went straight at the pin and it went in. So, yeah, it was a good feeling. STEVE TODD: Certainly helps the round along, doesn't it, but you're in a good position now in the tournament. JOOST LUITEN: Yeah, 7‑under for the tournament, and great position for the weekend and we just need to keep on playing. It's very tough out there. You just need to make pars and sometimes you have to sneak in a birdie or an albatross; that will help. STEVE TODD: And doing quite well in the team competition, as well. Could be taking something else home at the end of today. JOOST LUITEN: Yeah, we'll wait for the other teams to finish, but we did well as a team with Dawie and Enrique, the amateur. He did very well on the holes where he had a shot. Yeah, if we get the car, it would be a nice bonus. STEVE TODD: Give us a sense, the first tournament of the year, how everything is going and coming into shape. JOOST LUITEN: I didn't really do a lot over the winter.  I had three weeks off and I didn't really practice. So it's a bit‑‑ you never know how you're going to play if you come back after three weeks but luckily the game is still all right. The funny thing is yesterday it felt terrible and just starting to get into the right feeling again, and I was making some good swings today so that gives you some trust hopefully for the coming days. Q. If you could just give us a sense of how you think the course was today from yesterday? JOOST LUITEN: It was a completely different course than yesterday. Yesterday the wind was completely the other way around, so all the holes that were playing into the wind were downwind yesterday, and yeah, you really had to think about a new game plan. You really have to battle against the elements again, and that's the wind here. It's a tough course, because the greens are so small; the targets are so small, and you have to be very accurate. And then with the tough breeze, it's just a very good test of golf out there. I think it shows you that the golf course doesn't have to be 7,000 or more meters. Q. It was your birthday on Sunday, I believe? JOOST LUITEN: Tuesday. Q. Can I ask what kind ofstatus ‑‑ JOOST LUITEN: Yeah, I'm in a good space, I feel all right and happy to be playing in. These tournaments, small fields, they are always great to play in, four rounds of golf. Basically, yeah, it's a good way to start the season. Yeah, I'm feeling all right so we'll see if we can keep it up. Q. Could you tell us after a good day today what you think will be key tomorrow in maintaining the momentum and what do you think of the other chasing guys, like Louis is still there? JOOST LUITEN: There's still many guys that are close to me, and it's just packed up on the top. So I'm not really looking at the other guys. I'm just trying focus on my own game. You have to hit the greens here and you have to make some putts. If I can keep doing that, then we'll see what that brings us on Sunday. But it's still a long way to go. And I'm not thinking ahead really. I'm just going to relax a bit today, we come back tomorrow, we'll see what kind of conditions we have tomorrow, and then we go out on the course and try to make the best of it. Q. Were the fairways and greens softer than what it was yesterday? JOOST LUITEN: No, I don't think there was a lot of difference between today and yesterday. We did have a big storm last night, but the course drained pretty well, and the greens were good. So no big differences on that part. Q. How much golf did you play on the three‑week break? JOOST LUITEN: I practiced two days in Dubai last week, that's all. Q. What's your sort of‑‑ you've won a couple times on Tour now. What's the sort of objectives going into this year? JOOST LUITEN: Try to win again. And if you win again, there's a Ryder Cup coming up. So it's just trying to play as well as you can and try to get as many Ryder Cup points as you can, and then hopefully that's good enough to play in The Ryder Cup in the end of this year. That's the main goal. Q. Playing the Seve Trophy last September, did that whet your appetite? JOOST LUITEN: Yeah, it's a good tournament to play in. It's a good test for us. I've never played on a team and it was a good experience. I think those tournaments are good practice for the real Ryder Cup, not only for me, but for all Europe. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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