home

jobs

	products recent interviews FastScripts archive about ASAP Sports

Our Clients:

Browse by Sport

Find us on

Subscribe to RSS

Click to go to
Asaptext.com

View our
e-Brochure

EDS BYRON NELSON CHAMPIONSHIP

May 13, 2005

Billy Mayfair

IRVING, TEXAS

TODD BUDNICK: We welcome Billy Mayfair after a second round 7-under 63 at the 2005 EDS Byron Nelson Championship. Billy, good things happening this year after last year you finished outside the Top 125 for the first time in your first 16 years on Tour. You come back, and I think you've made 13 or 14 cuts this year so far.

BILLY MAYFAIR: Yes.

TODD BUDNICK: Talk about the difference. What rejuvenated you?

BILLY MAYFAIR: A couple things. Obviously I was very disappointed about the way I played last year. Last year I went to Rick Smith, a golf instructor, and him and I just started working together and we've really kind of clicked very well. He's understanding my game better and he's given me a lot of confidence.

One of the things we worked on was obviously going to the belly putter. I didn't hit the ball bad last year but putted horribly and decided at Greensboro last year to go to the belly putter and have putted with it ever since, and obviously it's given me a great deal of confidence.

TODD BUDNICK: You started today with that nice little streak, four birdies from 4 to 7, and didn't have a bogey until your 17th hole.

BILLY MAYFAIR: Yeah, I played real good today. I drove the ball solid, birdied the holes on the front that I needed to birdie, 4, 5, 6 and 7, hit wedges. I think the 8-iron was my longest club into 4. I made the birdies where I needed to and made a great birdie on 15 and 16 on the back side, made some tricky downhill left-to-right putts, just played really solid, hit the ball where I needed to, and like I said, my putter worked very well today.

TODD BUDNICK: In your experiences here at the Nelson, it's interesting if you look at your stats; you've made four of ten cuts the first ten trips here but have made five of your last six. Did something click there in between?

BILLY MAYFAIR: It's funny, I've never played all that well here since we moved over to Cottonwood. When we played just 72 holes over here at TPC, I seemed to play a lot better. This year and one other year I played well at Cottonwood. I think I shot 6- or 7-under one year at Cottonwood. Cottonwood is usually my Achilles heel here. I played well last week at Wachovia and obviously had a lot of momentum going into this week.

Q. How hard was it for you to make the switch to the belly putter?

BILLY MAYFAIR: Well, obviously when you're struggling and not putting well, anything different can make you feel better. The hardest thing for me with the belly putter was that I aimed the ball to the right, I cut my stroke; cut it left to get it back on line. Now with the belly putter I couldn't cut it anymore, had to stroke it straight back and straight through, so I had to change the way my eyes were lined up, and that took me a while.

I started at Disney last year working hard with Rick and working at home and played well in Korea in the off season and started putting well right away in Hawaii this year, and I've been riding it ever since. When you make 13 out of 14 cuts, even though you're not up there every week, you're making some putts to stick around.

Q. Did you have some sort of dramatic final straw sort of thing, I'm never going to putt this way again?

BILLY MAYFAIR: I shot 81 on Saturday's round at Greensboro last year. That was the final straw for me. I drove to the end of the -- I don't know how many of you have ever been to Greensboro. It's a funny entrance and there was a gentleman selling clubs in a barrel, I asked him if he had a belly putter, he said he did, and I used it the next day. I think I spent 15 bucks on that belly putter. Obviously it was something different and all that.

And then when I got to Disney the next week, I had talked to Vijay Singh because he had used the belly putter and I asked him what he thought was the best one and went to Bobby Grace at MacGregor and they made me up a few. Actually the first one they made up for me last year I'm still using today.

Q. You used the $15 putter on Sunday?

BILLY MAYFAIR: On Sunday, yeah.

Q. You made a pretty radical change when you went to the belly putter, but still, is it more a matter of confidence?

BILLY MAYFAIR: Absolutely, it's a great deal of confidence. The biggest difference obviously is confidence, but last year when I'd get done putting I'd go back to the room and think about how I was stroking it and the way I'm going to stroke it and I'd wake up thinking about it. This year I've practiced and done my job, and once I go back to the room, I enjoy my family and I'm watching TV and not thinking about it as much. I'm thinking about it every once in a while; I think every golfer thinks about it off the golf course. But I'm not beating myself up this year like I was last year, and I think that helps you mentally anyway.

Q. Are you essentially striking the ball the way you did last year and the putting is that much different?

BILLY MAYFAIR: I'm hitting the ball better, too. The new Titleist ball, the new Titleist driver I got at Carlsbad at the start of the year has been working. Working with Rick has changed my swing a little bit; I'm able to turn the ball over and it makes me a more aggressive player. It enables me to make more putts.

Q. When did you start working with Rick?

BILLY MAYFAIR: Right after the first round of the Greater Milwaukee Open.

Q. (Inaudible).

BILLY MAYFAIR: I knew I had to go to someone else, so I called Phil Mickelson; Phil Mickelson has been a good friend of mine forever and I know he works with Rick, and I asked him if he thought it would be good for me to start working with Rick, and Phil absolutely agreed. Rick was my next phone call.

It's worked out better than I ever thought. You never know when you go to a new instructor what he's going to talk about and all that, but Rick and I really clicked. We were good friends, but now we're really good friends and we've really kind of clicked together, which has been nice.

Q. I guess somewhat like Furyk's swing was often analyzed, your putting stroke used to be -- is it kind of nice to have that, where you don't turn on the TV and --

BILLY MAYFAIR: It's vice versa. As long as I keep coming in here and keep shooting 63s, I don't care what my putting stroke looks like, if it's cutting or straight back and straight through. Obviously it was nice having that as people would say. The strangest thing is people would be around the green, and you'd hear, "Watch this stroke. Watch this guy putt," and you're trying to hit a putt and all that. It was fun, but like I said, anything that works is great.

Q. You've been out here for so long. When you have a year like you did last year, do you start to think maybe this is it for me, maybe I should get ready for the Champions Tour, or did you still think there was golf left in you?

BILLY MAYFAIR: I still thought there was some golf left, I really did. Obviously I would lie to you if I said I had a one-year exemption and I knew if I didn't play well I was going to have to go back to Tour school. Obviously some bad thoughts come into your mind and all that, but one of the things I wanted to do was I wanted to play some tournaments during the off season, try and get some confidence back, which I did over in Korea, and I wanted to start right away in Hawaii. I think I played Hawaii, Bob Hope, Phoenix, played almost every tournament but AT & T on the West Coast to try to get my confidence back. I made every cut and that helped me a great deal playing a little bit better.

Q. Where is your confidence level compared to when you've been at your best?

BILLY MAYFAIR: It's pretty close right now. What I love about right now is I know my golf swing, know my putting stroke. I know my game a lot better than I did three or four years ago, so if I do hit a bad shot, I know how to correct it and fix it right away.

Q. What did you pay for the new belly putter?

BILLY MAYFAIR: That one I got for free.

Q. Better deal than the cheapo out of the barrel?

BILLY MAYFAIR: Absolutely.

Q. Were you one of those that always looked at it as kind of going over to the dark side, just resisted --

BILLY MAYFAIR: I don't know, I watched Vijay putt for a lot of years with that belly putter, and he putted awfully well with it. A lot of guys who switch to it seem to putt very well, and to me it just takes a lot of the thinking out of it. That's really what I was after. I just wanted to get over and get my eyes over the ball and start stroking it again and not worrying about mechanics.

Q. Retief was in here earlier talking about Byron, about his career. You've played here forever. Is it still fun for you to come and be around Mr. Nelson even though you know his whole stories and everything?

BILLY MAYFAIR: Absolutely. I've known Mr. Nelson for a long time, and being here for so many years I've had his -- he's autographed his books to me and all that, and he's written me a few nice letters and all. Just walking up yesterday up 18 and seeing Mr. Nelson and Peggy there on the 18th green, it just -- it's just a very special feeling, special moment because you don't see that at all out here on this PGA TOUR.

Q. Does he remember your name from year to year?

BILLY MAYFAIR: Absolutely he does.

Q. He calls you Billy?

BILLY MAYFAIR: Yes.

Q. You said it was nice to not be thinking so much. What kind of point did you reach? Did you have all kinds of strange thoughts running through your head?

BILLY MAYFAIR: I work with a sports psychologist; Bob Rotella and I worked together a lot and we were both just kind of dumbfounded. It wasn't that I wasn't putting in the hours, putting in the work and all that, just wasn't getting anything out of it. I would putt on the practice green and get on the golf course and it was two different things.

Q. And you'd get up there and have what kind of thoughts? What was happening?

BILLY MAYFAIR: I just basically wasn't finishing the stroke. I don't want to say I had the yips, but I wasn't stroking the ball through, wasn't hitting it on my lines, and then obviously if you do that you don't hit them at the right speed, so everything was just kind of off. I don't know, I don't remember that much. I try to forget about it.

Q. You have a personal connection with this place, too, I understand?

BILLY MAYFAIR: Absolutely.

Q. So is it nice to be playing well here?

BILLY MAYFAIR: It's always nice to be playing well here. My wife and I, we were married here this Tuesday 11 years ago on the 18th green, so we had our anniversary on Tuesday, so that was very nice. Every time I walk off the 18th green I see the sprinkler heads just off the edge, and we were married right by the sprinkler heads. They wouldn't let her walk on the greens because she had heels on, so we did it right off the edge.

Q. So your anniversary is always here?

BILLY MAYFAIR: Last year I think we were either a week ahead or a week before. A couple times we haven't. I think it's the first time in 11 years it hit right on Tuesday again.

TODD BUDNICK: Can we just have your birdies, starting with the one on 4?

BILLY MAYFAIR: The one on 4, I hit a driver in the right-hand rough, hit an 8-iron in from about 150 yards 15 feet from the hole, made that for birdie.

5, I hit wedge in from about 125 yards, about six feet from the hole, made that.

6, I hit driver, about 70 yards to the hole, hit a little L-wedge in there about ten feet from the hole, made that.

And then the next hole, I hit driver and had sand wedge in from about 100 yards, about six feet from the hole, made that.

11, the par 5, I hit a 3-iron just short of the green, chipped up to about five feet from the hole, made that for birdie.

14, hit a 6-iron in from about 180 yards just to the right of the hole, about 15 feet, and made that.

15, I hit a driver and a 7-iron in about 15 feet from the hole. Again, made that.

16, I hit 3-wood just left of the green in two and kind of flopped it up there about six feet from the hole, made that.

Bogey on 18, I hit 7-iron from about 200 yards just on the front edge and the pin was back right and I three-putted from there.

TODD BUDNICK: Thanks, Billy.

Q. You said Cottonwood Valley has always been your Achilles heel. Has there kind of been one nemesis hole that you don't seem to really --

BILLY MAYFAIR: No, I think the hardest thing about that is everyone expects to play well on that golf course. They need to shoot a low number there, especially if they haven't played well the first day, or if it's the first day they like to get a low number. If you don't do it you're kicking yourself because you've given up some shots.

Q. Short and tricky?

BILLY MAYFAIR: Short and tricky, but that golf course is getting harder and harder every year.

End of FastScripts.

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297