BUICK CLASSIC

June 9, 2002

Loren Roberts

TODD BUDNICK: We have Loren Roberts, third runner-up today.

Loren, let's just start with some comments on the round.

LOREN ROBERTS: Well, I tried three different golf swings out there today. Probably found one that worked at the end. (Laughs).

I started out pretty good, really. I had some birdie chances the first couple of holes and made about a 40-footer on 4 for birdie.

Then on 6, I tried to get a little too aggressive and hit a little sand wedge over the green and then I made bogey at 5.

Then came right back and made a birdie at 6.

Then just kind of drove it through the fairway at No. 7, hit a good wedge onto the back fringe, and then 3-putted the seventh hole. From then on, I really just hit some funny shots through the turn.

I drove it up in the rocks on No. 8. I had to chip out of the trees and actually, I had a 3-iron in there for my third shot. Really made a good 5.

Came back and made another birdie at 9 out of the front left bunker there. So I had nine holes of Mr. Toad's Wild Ride on the front side.

I hit every green on the back side coming in and had some chances and just didn't make any putts. Missed it from about eight feet at 13 and missed it from about 5 feet on 14 and then 3-putted from just on the back edge at 15. That was kind of the tournament right there.

Then I hit it in there about five feet at 17 and made birdie. I didn't drive it where I could get it anywhere near the green on 18 in two, so I just laid up and ended up making a par.

Q. Chris missed a ton of fairways today, and at times looked like he was all over the place. Yet he managed to recover nine times out of ten. Just your sense of what he was doing out there, and did you think that he was going to implode at one point?

LOREN ROBERTS: Well, obviously, he's trying to win his first golf tournament. You know, strength is his game. I felt like he took a couple of chances, pulled driver out when maybe he should have, but he has confidence in that club. That's his best club in his bag.

But the reason he won today was that he made the putts when he had to. That's what it always boils down to is, to win out here, you've got to make the putts when it matters.

Usually, you find that you've got to make two putts for pars on the back nine, and, you know, crucial putts, in the five- to eight-foot range, and he made a good one for bogey at 12, and that really saved him right there.

He made a good putt for par from about five feet at 11. He left it short there.

He made the putts when he had to. And that's why he won.

Q. Do you feel a sense of an opportunity missed today?

LOREN ROBERTS: I feel like I let this one get away. I didn't hit it good enough on Saturday and Sunday. If I had hit it like I did the first two days, I would have been in pretty good shape.

I don't want to take anything away from Chris. He played great. The golf course played harder today than it has all week. He went out and won the golf tournament, but I really felt like I let this one get away from me, I really did.

TODD BUDNICK: Thank you, Loren.

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