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BELLSOUTH CLASSIC

April 2, 2004

Tim Petrovic

DULUTH, GEORGIA

JOAN vT ALEXANDER: Thank you, Tim, for joining us for a few minutes in the media center at the BellSouth Classic. You started out like a bang with three birdies there on the back side, which was your first nine, and you kind of righted the ship here and got back into position going into the weekend.

TIM PETROVIC: Yeah, I made a couple of mental errors. I was in position on 18 to make a birdie, probably go to 9 under and I kind of dunked it out and it was short and I ran the putt by and it was the first putt I missed all week. It dove left on me. I missed the hole by like three feet. I was a little stunned right there. I was licking my chops to make 3 or 4, and I walk out of there with 6, but that's golf.

Then the first hole, I probably had about two feet and I missed that. So now I'm thinking, what is going on here? It's like a conspiracy. The first hole, the green was a little chopped up and I just made a good stroke. Didn't hit it I don't like to really pound the ball into the hole and it kind of zigzagged and missed, and then I was a little more stunned at that point.

Then a big point I think was on the third hole, which was my 12th hole. I left myself about a two and a half footer, and this was a hard putt from the two I just missed and now I'm going straight down the hill. I was telling my dad, we were on the putting green, there's a couple of putts that sometimes you have to just firm it in, and it's just one of those down the hill that you have to just firm it. You can't mess around with it. I knocked it right in and took a deep breath and kind of righted the ship. Even though it was a par, I felt a little better because I had made a tough putt.

I hit a really nice shot on No. 5 and I think I was about 25 feet and I made that. That kind of made me feel a little bit better in terms of getting my round going again.

Probably hit one of my best wedge shots on next hole. Didn't hit a good tee shot on 6 and hit a beautiful sand wedge past the hole and it spun all the way back and kind of tried to I say wiggle it in, because the ball is just kind of zigzagging. They are at a speed where you really can't bang it in. At the end of the day, they are just all footprints and spike marks.

JOAN vT ALEXANDER: How long was that putt on 6?

TIM PETROVIC: It was probably about, I'm going to say, six or seven feet.

JOAN vT ALEXANDER: And the bogeys on 7 and 8?

TIM PETROVIC: 7 was just you're going to make bogeys out here. I just don't like to make, what they call it in tennis, unforced errors, and that was one of them. I was down the hill, even before I hit the shot, I had a 9 iron out and hit it on top of the bunker. I even said to my dad, we don't want to go long and for whatever. The reason I switched clubs, just to make sure I could hit it over the green and hit it right over. I was dead. Didn't have a hot. Almost pulled off a great chip shot. Had a straight downhill putt and just lagged it down there from ten feet because I didn't want to have another 10 footer coming back.

Then on 8, I hit it to the front right and I had an up and over putt from about 50 feet. It was really tough to judge speed. I kind of ripped it by the hole about ten feet and missed that.

But on 9, probably hit one of my best shots of the day. I hit a little 8 iron in there to that front pin, I think it was like 156 and kind of bounced past the hole. I did a little it was breaking in there and all of a sudden it hit something, straightened out, caught the edge of the hole, went all the way around and in.

Q. Were you aware that the guys in front of you were kind of imploding?

TIM PETROVIC: Imploding? No. Who imploded?

Q. Olazabal and Tambellini both.

TIM PETROVIC: I didn't really look at the board. If I first don't look at the board all day, then I'll be trying I don't want to try not to look. I looked and I didn't see either one of them up there. I saw that I was still on the first page and in touch. Just have to go out and do my business and play my own game.

Q. Guys said they thought the pins were tougher today, which made it tougher than yesterday in some ways.

TIM PETROVIC: Yeah, I think in the afternoon, the greens are a little tougher. They dried out a little. You can hit I missed two putts inside of three feet, just one of those deals. And if you're fortunate enough to get those in, and I have been fortunate all week up to that point.

But, yeah, the pins were tough. They were in some tough spots. You still had to drive the ball pretty good. With the temperature and the wind the way it is, you can make a bogey just like that. It wasn't hard to make three or four bogeys in a row.

Q. The birdie at 9, was that a relief that you got a birdie or a relief that you were getting in out of the weather?

TIM PETROVIC: Yeah, it was a little bit of relief. I don't want to say I was grinding a little bit. I was kind of wearing myself, giving myself a tough time inside. And I kind of let it go before I hit my tee shot on 9; just hit your shot and get your short iron. I knew I would have a short iron. I checked where the pin was; I knew I would have probably a nice 8 iron or 9 iron today. The shot was set up for me to hit a nice, high cut into the crosswind and it came down soft. I knew if I hit a good shot in will and I hit a good putt I just hit a terrible putt on the hole before. So it was a little bit of relief, yes.

Q. Was No. 1 playing into the wind when you were on it?

TIM PETROVIC: I don't think I've ever hit 5 iron into that hole two days in a row. I think in the Pro Am they teed off at 6:57 and I hit a 3 iron in there. It's incredible. It was into the wind. I think we barely got it. I hit it straight up and barely got it over the hill.

Q. Inaudible?

TIM PETROVIC: Cold wind. If it was warm wind, we could probably get it up there a little bit.

Normally if you hit it down the right center of the fairway, there's trees up there about 300 yards up, and sometimes those get in your way to hit it to the green. So you have to try to stay on the left side, but we were not even within 50 yards of that.

JOAN vT ALEXANDER: Thank you, Tim, for joining us.

End of FastScripts.

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