STUART APPLEBY (66-67-69-67)

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Stuart Appleby, congratulations on winning the 2006 Shell Houston Open wire to wire, second win here in Houston. Congratulations on a great week, 19 under par, six shot win. Opening comments.

STUART APPLEBY: I thought if we didn't get the wind that 15 under plus score might be a chance on the cards. Today was the typical day I think we thought we should have had for four days that would have kept scoring a lot higher, probably around the 10 under par mark, 10 to 12. I enjoyed the week obviously. To have a comfortable victory has never left my lips. I've never had that luxury. It was nice to know coming down the last part of the day that things were in hand and it was just a little bit easier to relax.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Talk about winning for the second time in one season. This is the first time you've done this in 11 years on the PGA TOUR.

STUART APPLEBY: That was something I had always got off to good starts in the last three years, and there needed to be another dose of that throughout the year, and there hadn't been. So '03, '04 and '05 were good years but I didn't feel like they were great years. Certainly now winning twice puts that feeling, an emotional feeling at a high level, to say that I won twice. It's a good year. Winning twice on the Tour in a year is a good achievement for me. Other players are probably thinking four or five and other guys are thinking if they don't win six it's a bad year. I think winning once or twice proves to you that what you're doing works, and it can work more than once every Blue Moon.

Q. Do your expectations of yourself change?

STUART APPLEBY: Absolutely not one level. From the time I won here in '99 until the time I won now, I don't expect anything. What I expect to do is to compete my best any given week, the best I can, and work with what I have the best I can and respect the swing and chipping, putting, whatever is in my game, and this week my game was at a stronger level in a rounded aspect. What I'm trying to do is get better at having a well rounded game. I know that that level, that quality of golf is going to put me in contention more often, and that's really what it is about, being near contention or in contention. Today I was always there, but a lot of weeks you've got to fight to find your way into contention.

Q. Do you prefer winning by a bunch or winning be last?

STUART APPLEBY: A bunch is a lot more enjoyable the last hour or two hours of the day. I kept it on the leaderboard once I made the birdies early in the back nine, I sort of said, right, okay, I said to Joe, let's knuckle down, push down, drive this thing home. That really was my focus. I got just as intent as I was at the start of the day because I thought, well, now I've got a lead that I just want to outgrow. It's something that I knew I could win from here but I didn't want to give up any part of my lead. I wanted to hold it or extend it. I knew what I had to do to do that, much like I used that sort of food for thought I had at Kapalua back when I was dueling with Vijay and he had a run at me. Someone could make a run at me, but what do I have to do and it'll be just make pars coming in. I got my goal of shooting 3 under par on the front nine and knew if I could do the same thing on the back no one was going to catch me.

Q. You just seemed very relaxed all week. Was that just something that I thought I saw or did you kind of feel like, all things considered, if you got going this could be your week?

STUART APPLEBY: Yeah, that makes sense. I felt like last week when I was practicing at home that I felt like if I played like I was practicing I could win. Not going to because you don't know what someone else was going to do but I knew there would be no way I could finish out of the Top 10. You know when you've got something that works. I got off to a good start so that proves that in tournament play it works. Then I just really went with that same feeling, same thoughts in my swing, and just let that mature under competition stress, and it worked.

Like I mentioned yesterday, I have come into events feeling very confident about my game, and it's not always worked. But this one it certainly did.

Q. What was the basic thought you had that you were holding on to, that you brought in?

STUART APPLEBY: Just tiny little swing things. I won't bore you with details, but little swing things that I knew was the difference between an average shot and just more and more great shots. I just knew if I could execute that part of my swing, pretty much whether I was under pressure or not under pressure, it would work. That's the secret. Everyone is trying to build a swing that works under pressure. It worked all week. Very few times did it let me down.

Q. You mean there was pressure on you this week?

STUART APPLEBY: Yeah, I think you always feel pressure. As the week goes on, the pressure mounts. It's really a bit like bleeding it off. You've got to bleed it off and keep it at a level where the cooker doesn't blow. That's really what I was keeping an eye on, that I kept everything under control and controlled my part of the game because I knew if I was executing my putts and placement on the greens that highly unlikely someone was going to catch me.

Now, I didn't ever think I had the tournament won going into today, but I knew what I had to do that would allow me to win the tournament.

Q. Are these swing thoughts something you think you can sustain long term to get to the next level?

STUART APPLEBY: Well, they've proven that they work. I grasped the idea and I nurtured it and it worked. That's really what it's about. Winning at good events or even making the cut can plant a seed that this is what I need to do because this got me out of a hole because this moved me up a level. I think there's some sustenance in what I worked on this week.

Q. You talked last week about trying to get to the next level. How far are you and do you think you can get there?

STUART APPLEBY: God, you're picky, aren't you? Time frame?

Q. Just curious.

STUART APPLEBY: Look, I need to play more like this, this type of golf. I play like this this is not the next level for me. It's the next level on paper, but long time I need to keep doing this stuff, keep moving, keep doing this. I may never say I don't know if a player thinks that they're at the next level. I think we always climb through those levels very slowly. Sometimes we don't even know we pass them. But I don't feel like winning twice has put me on another level. I've had good chances to win previous years twice and didn't, so there may be a level there, at least on paper there is.

Q. What is the thing that you're going to remember about this week that's different from the other times that you've won? What's going to be the

STUART APPLEBY: I don't know, I think a seven time winner before today, and I think seven time winner, I think I know what I'm doing. I've got a couple shot lead. I know how to win before, I'm really just telling myself not how great I am but saying you've done this before, done it different ways, playoffs and what have you, but I thought, well, it worked for two days, worked for one day, worked for second, third. You don't change the recipe, you just go and grab stuff and start mixing in the bowl, and that was really what I thought today.

I think there was no time in the tournament where I felt like I had to have a change in game plan, where I had to be more aggressive or more defensive because I felt like I was in ultimate control of what I was doing and no one else was putting enough pressure on me to make me be more aggressive or more conservative. The course was tough enough where you couldn't be silly out there. I knew that sort of plays a bit into my hands where I can play conservative but also sneak a birdie in.

Q. Joe talked about at 17 that you finally asked how you stood.

STUART APPLEBY: I knew how I stood but I wanted a second opinion. That's what I pay him for, I guess.

Q. You wanted to make sure that you were at 19 instead of 20?

STUART APPLEBY: No, I didn't I knew where I was, but I just wanted to hear it from his lips. I didn't want to come in and someone say, "oh, no, you only have a one shot lead."

Q. At that point was it fun? It seems like you were very focused and you knew what you needed to do swing wise and things like that.

STUART APPLEBY: Yeah, I was very focused. I've watched tournaments where players had big victories and thought I don't know how easy it would be or how crazy it would be. I felt comfortable and relaxed knowing there was no way I could mess up the tournament, but it's hard to switch off because you're in your golf shoes, you're wearing your outfit, walking the fairways, playing golf. You're still there, still in the office, and you just don't and the door wasn't closed. I was still there, and it's hard to switch off and just walk over and whatever, sign autographs and whatever. You just can't do that.

I certainly felt it was the first time I've ever had the time I could calm myself down, not switch off but know that everything was totally under control and there was no way possible anything could happen. No one can take anything from me and I couldn't do anything about it to screw it up.

Q. You kind of felt like Tiger Woods with a double digit lead.

STUART APPLEBY: Yeah, whatever, the U.S. Open.

Q. And The Masters.

STUART APPLEBY: Yeah, you're right. You're still switched on. I think sometimes you think someone will just walk up on the last from 30 feet and fling it down there. You are still there and still can't break your routine even if you have a six shot lead because it shows you're stepping out of your zone.

Q. Was there any significance to you in doing it wire to wire?

STUART APPLEBY: I'll use that for next time there's a wire to wire chance, saying I've done it before, I know how to do it, so yeah.

Q. Would your game this week be capable of winning a major, if you take the game you had this week into the majors?

STUART APPLEBY: God, that's hard. It was good. I'm not sure because I haven't been in contention enough, I don't think, to know what was that level I had then. Maybe that might have been my best game and it wasn't good enough, so I don't know. I think the way I played today, if I played like that in the major, there's no doubt I can be a contender at the back.

Q. What do you think they'll do to Appleby proof this place next year?

STUART APPLEBY: Oh, please. This is not Augusta. They don't have to prove anything. This course has got enough teeth on it. It's all weather dependent like most courses are. This might be one of the lower scoring tournaments that you might see here because I've seen Texas a lot more brutal than this in difficulty, and I think my score might stand for a while just because the course, we got enough of a good break in the weather.

Q. Other than the fact that you won out here, what's your take on the course and this as a tournament site?

STUART APPLEBY: Well, a few obvious things. It's nice to play everyone is a bit concerned about changing courses, especially when you change one that's only 100 yards away, and that was a good golf course. I played well there when I last played there. I liked the feel of this course. I liked the feel of this course. I liked the way the greens were designed. I thought they were very fair. Everything moved, you could position your ball on the greens near the flag if you wanted to be aggressive. You could be conservative and have a good conservative effort where you could be conservative to the bad side and have the same length putt and have a real tough one. You could plan your way around and be aggressive. The greens were firm but very fair. You had to draw the ball, you had to fade the ball.

There was nothing wrong with this golf course. It was definitely out there. It was repetitious in look but didn't play the same. I think everybody felt comfortable out on the course and I think their eye fit it very early. It was a good change. Changes are good sometimes but sometimes players are a bit weary of changes, and I think this one was fun.

Q. But that was a place you finished second and didn't come back the last two years?

STUART APPLEBY: No, I'll come back now. I know this course well now, and hopefully I can get a love affair like I had at Kapalua.

Q. Is the comfort zone you had this week, is there in any way can you liken it to the comfort zone you had when you walk out to Kapalua?

STUART APPLEBY: Kapalua is another level of game because Kapalua, I don't know, it's not as. This is a bit different. I think every wind is a little bit different in other ways. All in the way you feel. Some things are very different. Kapalua, I have a calm confident feeling, which I had today, but I think, I don't know, could be the scenery, could be anything. Could be knowing that you've won there before that it just I haven't had a second on the same course but a win, and try and work out how I developed that relationship with Kapalua. I know this course, how to do it, where to hit it, know where to bounce it, and that's something I'd like to work on.

Q. There obviously wasn't any big turning point or anything to this thing, but do you have a favorite like snapshot moment from the week that you look at, that you look back at as that was what this tournament was?

STUART APPLEBY: A nice snapshot, an overall section, so many putts were not critical but sort of on that theme, for par yesterday, and some today for birdie, and they both meant the same thing. They both meant holding something and maintaining another way holding something again. One was for par, one was for birdie. There was no critical thing, really. No nine, no nothing. I was trying to keep myself emotionally steady. I found the times that if I was more nervous I found a way to get myself back and level. There's only so much you can try and concentrate. There's levels above that and below that, but the level you want to be at is a zone, and I've managed to find that often enough. That puts me in a productive state of mind versus not productive, not noticing a break or not noticing a spot or a piece of danger on the fairway. I managed to be there a bit more often, and that obviously led to productive scores.

Q. How do you feel about this being next year moved the week before The Masters. Are there similar shots out there?

STUART APPLEBY: Nothing really resembles. It's not preparation for Augusta. The only thing that's preparing for Augusta is competition, and Augusta is a different level because it's one of the higher levels of competition in any given time. It's certainly not preparation, but it's competition preparation. It's you engaging. Certainly if I play like this next year going into Augusta, I'll have the next event to gain the momentum and the vibe going on.

Q. I don't mean to get past the happy moment of today, but looking ahead to next week in New Orleans, what is the thought about that tournament and going back to New Orleans after what happened and the future of it?

STUART APPLEBY: Well, the Tour talked about it quite a bit for quite a long time now, probably the last six months to eight months we've been really talking about this is the biggest event New Orleans has had and may have this year. Certainly it was a concerted effort by the Tour to sort of ask let's help out, really think about this tournament more than maybe some of the others in a priority sense, not others being the events after this, but that this needs to be maybe just looked at a bit firmer than normal for obvious reasons, for what it can do for the town, for the charitable donation side of things, and an event is back in town, the whole aspect of it. We looked at that more than we would have a year or two ago because of obviously what the locals are dealing with.

Q. I guess there's the big bang of doing it this year and doing what you said from that dynamic. What about beyond that, though, as far as that event?

STUART APPLEBY: I have no clue of the event past what I'm about to do next week, play there next week.

We don't know the future. I don't know the future, so I think us turning up at least instigates what we're trying to do as golfers in that town and how the town is going to recover. It's going to take five years plus for the town to maybe have a new identity in a way, a little bit different, a different feel, obviously for the better. We're going back and trying to help out. There's events organized asking for wives and people helping out people with trying to pick up the pieces.

There's fliers out there looking for help, we're just obviously trying to do it and raise as much money as we can charitable wise for the charities in town, and look, the country is very aware of what's going on there, and I'm very sure no one has forgot about it. Like I say, I think there's a good five year building plan there that we will be thinking of this for a long time.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Stuart, congratulations.

BOB ESTES  (71-69-66-69)

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Bob Estes, thank you for joining us for a couple minutes here at the Shell Houston Open. Good week for you. Stuart Appleby did his best to run away with the tournament, but you had a good week. Maybe some comments about your week, definitely a good one for you.

BOB ESTES: It was a good week. 12 was the best finish I had this year prior to finishing second today. I knew I was playing better, even though I was missing cuts in Florida. I knew my game was getting better and better and finally things started to come together this week as opposed to last week and prior to that.

Anyway, I didn't play a whole lot earlier in the year, either. I turned 40 back in February, so I took a three week break in addition to some of the weeks I normally skip. I had only played seven tournaments coming into this week when the other guys had played 10 or 11 or 12. Anyway, I'm still kind of getting in the flow. It's certainly different when you're in contention or somewhat in contention when you haven't done it in a while, then usually going off first like I did Saturday last week or something like that. But anyway, playing better, and yeah, it feels good.

Q. What's your early impression of your 40s?

BOB ESTES: Well, I didn't feel any different from my 30s so far. I'm trying to get younger as I get older. I train hard and on a good vitamin supplement program, so I'm trying to stay lean and fit and extend my career. Actually that's part of my plan and has been for quite a long time. Hopefully I'm trying to make up for lost time. I'm just now figuring out some things and getting out of some bad habits that I've had my entire professional career, and I'm still not there yet, but I'm gaining on it.

But I'm trying to buy myself some time. I want to still be able to be very competitive out here and have a chance to win tournaments and hopefully majors into my 50s. That's kind of the plan, so I'm still trying to get healthier and not let anything slip if I can help it.

Q. What have been the hardest bad habits to get rid of?

BOB ESTES: Usually it's those cookies in the locker room. Almost everywhere we go they have cookies or brownies, and man, it's hard to pass up a cookie tray after a round on the course. I have a sweet tooth, but try to stick to a little bit of dark chocolate every day and not all the other stuff.

Q. You talked about your confidence level yesterday. You shot 66 Saturday. What does it say when you not only shoot 66 Saturday but have a good week.

BOB ESTES: Yeah, I mean, today means more than yesterday really. Shooting 69 today, which obviously still could have been better, means more than shooting 66 on Saturday when you're not really in contention yet. I was just getting myself into contention. It's all about Sunday out here, and I hit a lot of quality shots that I maybe wasn't hitting enough of in the past, and I didn't make every putt I needed to make but I think I'm figuring a few things out with the putting, as well.

Hopefully I'm getting better. I think I am, my teacher knows I am, so I'll keep working on it and hopefully the confidence level will continue to rise and I'll just play better and better golf.

Q. It's awfully tough to come back I think from four back. Is that something you think in your mind, I know this is pretty difficult to do but I'm just going to try and make some birdies and finish high, or are you of the mindset "I can win this"?

BOB ESTES: I definitely felt like I could win it, but of course a lot of that had to do with what Stuart was going to do. He could easily play a solid round and shoot even par because it's not an easy golf course. With the wind and the pins in the corners and the wind sometimes changing directions, and there's obviously some places you can get in trouble off the tee, like on No. 8 when I hit it right in the water. I knew I still had a chance but I couldn't make any mistakes, and when I bogeyed 8 and 9, that didn't necessarily put an end to my chances, but when I bogeyed No. 14 after a really good shot when I thought I was going to have a short birdie putt, that was kind of the end of it for me probably. I didn't give up by any means. I was still trying to make birdies. But all I could do was par the last four.

Q. Were you ever looking at the leaderboard? Were you seeing 20 up there for a while and 19 and just going, "man"? Did it seem like a big hill to try and be climbing?

BOB ESTES: I never saw 20. Did he get it to 20? I would have given up for sure then (laughter).

I thought he was only 19. I might have bogeyed in, just given up (laughter).

No, obviously he was just playing well. Like I was saying earlier, the course is playing to wind, but 2nd is better than 3rd. We're playing for so much. Obviously the money, but there's so much more than that with trying to move up the Money List and get World Ranking points and make the Ryder Cup team and Presidents Cup team and qualify for the invitationals and World Golf Championship events. We're always playing for something, so 2nd is always better than 3rd, 3rd is better than 4th. Tiger is the only one that might say otherwise. For me I'm still trying to get into some of those tournaments that Tiger is winning.

Yeah, 2nd, of course I wanted to win, but like I said, I'd rather finish 2nd than 3rd.

Q. Does it mean a little bit more doing it close to home, too?

BOB ESTES: Oh, for sure. Hopefully before my career is over, I might have an opportunity to win the Texas Slam. I know there's not too much talk about that, but I think every player that grew up in the State of Texas would love to win all four events here in Texas. I've only got one so far and it sure would have been nice to make this No. 2. So yeah, there's the Grand Slam, the Texas Slam, so I've got that one to try to shoot for, as well. Even someone like Tom Kite, the best I know, didn't win any of the Texas events. So that tells you how tough it is when he grew up in the State of Texas and playing these kinds of courses and in that kind of wind.

Q. How close do you feel like you are to being the player you were when you were winning a couple times a season and Top 30 in the world, that type of thing, Top 20 type player?

BOB ESTES: As far as how my game feels, my game feels better than it did then. But only recently.

See, back then, we're going to get into all this ten finger baseball grip stuff again, but those last three tournaments I won, I won with the ten finger grip. I just hit the ball better that way at that point in my career than I could with an overlapped grip, so I played that way for quite a while, but I was limited, also, in what I could do. When I hooked up with Craig Coy back in I guess it was August of 2001, we were always kind of talking about the ten finger grip, the overlapped grip, and he pretty much let me do my own thing as far as playing with that ten finger grip.

Having won three times that way and only once with an overlapped grip, it kind of made it tough to let go of it. As we have continued to chip away at my new golf swing, if that's what you want to call it I kind of lost my train of thought there, but anyway, knowing that I won three times with the ten finger grip, it was kind of tough to get away from it and go back to the overlapped grip. But now it's easier for me to work the ball both directions if I have to. I've played with smaller grips with the overlapped grip so I have better touch on the shorter shots and the less full shots and things like that. I was pretty one dimensional I guess you could say when I won those three tournaments, and now I've maybe got a little bit more feel in my game and a little bit more variety as far as the shots that I can hit.

Q. You talk about winning majors into your 50s. Is that what I heard you say earlier? You talked about winning and maybe winning majors into your 50s? Did I hear that right?

BOB ESTES: Well, that's obviously getting I don't mean to get too far ahead of myself. I'm trying to win tournaments, of course, but I've also had a few chances to win major championships, as well. If my physical golf game is in good enough order to handle the challenge, I've always felt like mentally I was strong enough to get it done. But my physical golf game has just not been good enough to win more than I have or to hold up under some of the most extreme pressure.

I guess it was the I think it was the U.S. Open that Furyk won at Olympia Fields when I was still playing with the ten finger grip, and I knew I was going to have to get back to learning how to swing the club properly with the overlapped grip. So it's been a long, slow process, but you can tell from a lot of the shots that I hit out there, a lot of the iron shots in particular, some of the tee shots, I mean, I hit them just as good as they can be hit and exactly where I wanted to. Not all of them, but a lot of them felt just as good as they could be.

As far as what you're saying about the majors, you know, like I said, I'm just trying to buy myself more time. I'll be back in the weight room tomorrow with my trainer when I get back to Austin after tonight. I train hard and try to eat right, get enough rest and things like that because you think about somebody like Hale Irwin. If Hale Irwin would have stayed on this Tour until he was 55 or 56, Hale might have won another eight or ten times out here and won another major or two if he kept playing on the regular Tour because I think there were a couple majors he played in his 50s where he played really well and the other guys, as well, like Tom Kite or Tom Watson, some of those guys. Instead of going straight to the Senior Tour when they turned 50 that's not really my plan. I might play a few events or a few of the majors, but I'm hoping to still be playing out here, because like I said before, I felt like I've lost a lot of time up to now because of not having things where they needed to be to give me an opportunity to play my best golf.

Q. What did you think of this place as a tournament venue with the move over here?

BOB ESTES: We've got plenty of space, that's for sure. It's just so spread out. It would be nice if it wasn't so spread out. I mean, the rounds were really long, and that's the down side of it. They did shuttle us some, but it's just so spread out. There's so much distance between so many of the greens and tees. The golf course is plenty hard, plenty good. It's very challenging, but if it would not have rained on Friday morning, the greens probably would have been firmer yesterday and today and the scores probably wouldn't have been as good as what you saw.

It's definitely hard enough to challenge all of us. They put those pins in the corners and the wind is blowing a little bit and they've got the greens firm and fast. It's a plenty hard enough test.

Q. How will it be as a week before The Masters tune up, which is what it becomes next year?

BOB ESTES: Well, I really don't know for sure what you still have all the overseeded fairways and greens, I guess. So it just depends. Maybe you won't have the heat, maybe they won't have to water as much. I know that they were really watering the fairways a lot, more so than we would like to see. I was out playing a practice round, I think, on Tuesday evening, and the fairways were already so lush and green and they're watering them. I don't know if they are going to die. I don't know enough about ryegrass and how hot it has to be for it to die, but hopefully the golf course at that time of the year, they'll be able to let the fairways play a little firmer. Maybe they won't have to put as much water on the fairways because I'd like to see the fairways firmer just like the greens were firm, and then it would be even better prior to a major championship.

Q. Do you think changing the date will help or hurt the tournament overall?

BOB ESTES: Well, overall it's probably going to help because you're going to get more of the foreign players. When they come over early they almost always play a week before and then maybe a week after. Let's see, Vijay plays every week so you probably won't lose Vijay.

I know we're talking mostly about the players at the top of the list, but some of the players you'll definitely have a stronger field and you'll get a few more of the top players the week before The Masters, but a lot of guys like to take the week off before a major, and that's typically what I do, too. I usually don't play the week before because one thing you have to remember, as well first of all, the golf course might not match up as well to the tournament that you're going to play or the major you're going to play, but also, sometimes our tournaments, especially in the springtime, could easily get extended into Monday or Tuesday. Not many guys want to be stuck somewhere and not be able to stay in their normal major championship preparation routine, so most guys want to be able to fly in on Saturday or Sunday or Monday or whatever they do. So that's kind of the chance you take, also, when you play the week before a major.

Overall you'll definitely have a better field.

Q. Will you play?

BOB ESTES: Probably. I don't know if I would be able to not play now. Too many people were saying "we'll see you next year," so I was kind of like, "well, I guess I probably will be back." I'm not going to say for sure one way or another, but there's obviously a good chance that I would come back and play after playing so well this year.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Bob, thank you.

MATHIAS GRONBERG (68-69-67-73)

MATHIAS GRONBERG: It was hard. I didn't really get anything going, really fought hard. I just kept on missing a couple of putts there, 14, 15, 16, so that was hard.

Q. What was it like playing with Stuart; he's just kind of playing on cruise control and kind of pulled away. 
MATHIAS GRONBERG: He was making a lot of good putts. He was very nice to play with. He's a true gentleman of the sport. It was just nice to play. But unfortunately I couldn't really get going my own game.

Q. It must have been awfully tough to get to 19 looking at the scores today.

MATHIAS GRONBERG: 19 for me would have been hard. No, I needed to my chip on hole No. 8 would have gone in for an eagle and then of course I kind of three putted 9 and then another three putt on the back, so I could have gotten to 15, 16, 17 under today and unfortunately it went the other way.
I tried to make an eagle on 12 and 13. 12, I did a good birdie, but on 13 I tried to hit my rescue club really close, and it just went over the back there, and I made bogey. I thought at least birdie from what I had. I tried to make an eagle and that kind of shifted the momentum really hard against me. I made a really good up and down on the next hole but didn't kind of get the round going.
But I played a lot better than 1 over par today. I feel like I didn't really get anything going except the birdie on, what was it, 7 and 8.

Q. How did that chip on 8 not go in? That looked like it was dead center.

MATHIAS GRONBERG: It was close. I couldn't believe that it didn't go in because it was so close with maybe a foot left to roll out. But it was a great shot, and it was a good 4 anyway.

Q. You're leaving here with some positive stuff for the week even though today was a little disappointing for you?

MATHIAS GRONBERG: Yeah, you always learn playing in the last group, the final group, and I probably would learn next time that I didn't really need to go for the eagle on 13 as much as I did. I should have hit 3 iron or possibly a 4 iron a little short and possibly three putted or made a long putt for eagle there, and that probably would have helped me finish higher than I did.