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HP BYRON NELSON CHAMPIONSHIPMay 15, 2014Marc LeishmanIRVING, TEXAS THE MODERATOR: Marc Leishman joins us here in the after four under par, 66. Marc, great start for the week to you, if we can get comments on your round. MARC LEISHMAN: Yeah, it was a good start. Got off to a decent start. Good shot on the second, hit it straight into the sun, had no idea where it was and it comes down about inside a foot. So that was a good surprise. Then followed that with a bogey and another birdie so kept the momentum going. I had two birdies on the back nine, I think, 10 and 16. So it was fairly stress‑free for the most part, hit a lot of fairway and greens, and putted pretty well. Q. Comment about your season, up to this point and your expectations and how you feel about your game coming into the week. MARC LEISHMAN: Yeah, season is‑‑ well, from the start of this year it was decent. I had fifth at the Sony, second at Torrey Pines, bit of a dry spell there for a couple of months. Played fairly well at the PLAYERS, then I like this place, like next week and excited about the next few weeks, especially the rest of this week. Q. Marc, you mentioned liking this course. Obviously you have a good track record here. What is it about the course that you like so much? MARC LEISHMAN: I think the conditions. It's normally pretty windy around here, I enjoy playing in the wind, especially on golf courses where you can land it short of the green and bounce it up. I found a lot of courses that we play all year, if it's windy you have to land it on the green, here you can land it short and if you have to, run it up. I feel like I read the greens pretty well and on each hole there is one side that you can't miss it on as far as tee shots go, but there's one side that's normally alright, so I feel like it gives me a little bit more room. I think mostly it's the wind. I like playing in the wind. Q. You grew up playing in a lot of wind, right? MARC LEISHMAN: Yeah, I grew up in Warrnambool, which is known as "Windy Warrnambool" it's always windy, it's normally always blowing really hard so played in a lot of wind, yeah. Q. Pretty much on the same line, why you play this course so well, but I guess if you could go into what do you have to avoid out here? MARC LEISHMAN: I think the most important thing about this place is obviously avoiding the wrong side of the fairways, so, for instance, 3, you can't go left‑‑ sorry, you can't go right, 4 you can't go left, because of the hazard. You have to steer clear of the hazards, and general the other side is not great but it's playable. I think the most important thing is hitting greens. I found it tough to get up and down around the greens here, it's pretty grainy. It will generally roll‑‑ you're below the level of the green, it's tricky, I will say, if you get a good lie, it's ok, but generally you've got a pretty tricky shot. Q. You played well in January and then had a dry spell. Do you have anything that you attribute that to? MARC LEISHMAN: I tend to do that every year, for some reason, I don't know why. Whether it's the courses don't set up as well for me or what it is, but, yeah, probably didn't hit it quite as well as what I would have liked, wasn't holing any putts, but it's becoming a trend, which I would really like to change. Q. Tell me about your surprise at the par 3. Do you think you had covered the flag or was that out of nowhere when you saw the ball 4 feet away? MARC LEISHMAN: On the second? Yeah, I felt like I hit a really good shot. But when you look straight into the sun, I hit it and looked at the caddy and the other boys and they're sort of like, we don't know where it is either cause they look straight into the sun, then we could hear the crowd up there, it must have just caught an edge and ran over the edge and went to about that far. So it was a good surprise‑‑ like I said, I thought I hit a good shot but it's hard to tell when you're looking straight into the sun. That's one of the toughest shots in golf. Q. I'm sure you can answer this by you play well everywhere, but what is it about Australians playing well in Texas and do you think that's true? MARC LEISHMAN: Yeah, I guess so. It's generally pretty firm in Texas. Firm under foot and bouncy and windy. That's what we grew up on. We grew up on really firm golf courses and basically every day in Australia you play in the wind because most of the courses are along the coast and there are huge oceans around the coast of Australia and it's just always blowing. I guess that's got something to do with it, and I suppose a lot of Australians live here in Dallas and they might know the conditions or the grasses. Q. Ryan Palmer told us it was unusually windy today, hasn't seen it blow from that direction before. Did you feel like this? MARC LEISHMAN: It was a little bit different. Yesterday and the Pro‑Am it was completely different. We struggled to get to the green in 2 on 3, because it was playing‑‑ it was soft as well. It was a north wind and soft. Today it was a little different. It's normally a little bit more out of the south, I think it was a bit more from the west today is that right? I don't know, but it was a little bit different, some of the holes just played obviously different. Q. When it's like that do you have to adjust on the fly a little bit? MARC LEISHMAN: Not really. I think you just play with what the course gives you on the day. So I guess if it was completely different you would definitely have to change game plans and that sort of thing but off most of the tees I was hitting the same club. I think on 4 I hit a different club, a 3‑wood instead of 2‑iron, but for the most part I played it similar. Q. 3 is playing difficult, is that a cross wind there on that long par 4? MARC LEISHMAN: Probably now they're playing straight off the left so it's blowing you straight toward the water and the pins on the left. That's a tough hole in there is no wind and then put a bit of wind out there and especially with the soft conditions‑‑ normally you're hitting driver and then like an 8 or 9‑iron today I hit a good drive and hit a 6‑iron and that was when there was a bit of help. So it did change direction throughout the day and I'm guessing it would have been more across on 3. THE MODERATOR: All right, Marc, thank you. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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