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SHELL HOUSTON OPEN

April 21, 2005

Gavin Coles

HOUSTON, TEXAS

TODD BUDNICK: We welcome Gavin Coles after a 7-under 65 in the opening round of the Shell Houston Open. Gavin, cruising along, opening up with a 6-under 29, impressive start.

GAVIN COLES: It was a lot of fun. The balls were just going in from everywhere. It was tremendous.

The first three holes I had three putts over 20 feet, and I made two of them, so that was quite a nice start.

TODD BUDNICK: Give us an idea of your round, just kind of walk us through what was going well for you.

GAVIN COLES: Well, I just kept hitting it on the fairway and hitting it on the green and a few went in. I missed a real short one on 4 for birdie and then hit it close the next hole and made that for birdie.

I don't know, just every time I sort of looked at it, I seemed to read the right line and it seemed to start on that line and went in, so it was good.

TODD BUDNICK: Your second go-around on the PGA TOUR. You struggled two years ago on your rookie year. You've made four of six cuts and almost doubled the money you made from two years ago.

GAVIN COLES: It's amazing what happens when you get comfortable out here.

Q. Talk about that.

GAVIN COLES: I went from the Tour in Australia where I battled my way for a few years, eventually won a tournament and got over here on the Nationwide Tour and boosted my confidence a little bit, and then the next year I was here and didn't know what to do with myself. Every golf course seemed really long, it was a really wet year and it never suited me one bit.

When I get to a golf course like this and the fairways aren't running and I'm hitting it 250 and we're playing into the wind and I'm hitting it 230 and that didn't impress me one bit. Probably I defeated myself on a lot of these courses.

Q. How did you recover from that year two years ago?

GAVIN COLES: If you look at the stats it's the guy that putts the best and chips the best. It's not necessarily the guy that hits it the longest. It all comes down to education. We drive for show, putt for dough. I don't really care that I can't hit it 350 yards anymore. It doesn't matter to me. If I can hit it straighter than they can and I can hit just as many greens and I can putt it better than they can, what's it going to matter?

Q. This course has a reputation of favoring the long hitters. Is that sort of a psychological barrier to deal with?

GAVIN COLES: You tee it up on the 17th hole and you tell me if you can fly it 300 yards, are you going to take a wedge to that green or take it the long way around and hit a 3-iron.

To me a few of these holes don't actually hit the short hitter at all. They're so orientated towards the long hitter. A few of the courses to me, from when I play them, I feel the trouble is in the wrong spot, but that's only one. We play here once a year, so I've just got to learn to forget all that stuff and go and play and hit it on the fairway and hit it on the green.

Two years ago that's what I was like, like what's going on here, and defeating myself before I even teed it up. Now I go and play and do the best I can do and leave it to everybody else.

Q. What kind of chance do you feel like you have of keeping it going this week?

GAVIN COLES: Anything is possible, mate. Anything is possible. I've had a nice two weeks' rest and it's my first day back. I feel like I'm really putting the ball well, and if I can keep it out of that rough, it'll be great.

Q. Is today's round reflective of where your game is do you think?

GAVIN COLES: To be really honest with you, I think my golf swing has gotten better the last few years. I think I'm better mentally prepared to play the courses longer. I like the greens a bit harder, but I'm coming into some of these greens with 3-irons and 5-woods and hitting into the wind a 3-wood. If the weather stays like this and the wind doesn't blow much, anything is possible.

Q. Do you want to talk about your eagle?

GAVIN COLES: I didn't have an eagle today. There's four 2s on my card but there's no eagles. The par 3s were quite kind to me today, very kind indeed.

Q. You're one of the believers in the drive for show, putt for dough philosophy. What kind of putter are you?

GAVIN COLES: I was 191st on this Tour two years ago, and I think I'm 47th right now, so I think that's been quite a turn-around from two years ago. A lot of people think that I'm a good putter, that I play with, and it's all about reading the greens well and if you can read the line they're going to go in. You have your good weeks and bad weeks. You have to learn when you're putting well, keep the ball in play as good as you can, give yourself a chance.

Q. When you struggled out here, what was your mental process after that year, basically not making many cuts and all that? What made you feel like you could come back out here and succeed the next time around? What did you go through in your head there?

GAVIN COLES: I don't know, mate. Do you want to get better at the things that you do, learn from your mistakes? That's basically what we're here to do, learn and become better players and better people. That's what it's all about. You go home and you go "what did I do badly last year?" Before I tee it up, I can't win the golf tournament because I've already defeated myself because I'm going to hit one bad shot, I'm going to "Grrrr," you can't go through life like that. You've got to mentally improve what you're going to do but you've got to look at where your faults are and go from there, improve those things.

Q. Are you a leaderboard watcher?

GAVIN COLES: I love looking at the leaderboard.

Q. Were you enjoying seeing the names Singh and Coles right next to each other?

GAVIN COLES: I look for those names like my friends. To me this course for Vijay is probably a great course for him. The greens are great to putt on and he's a great putter. The course is long where he's going to be hitting a lot of shorter irons into the green. That's why he's the second best player in the world. I don't care his name is up there. You sort of expect him to be there. When I see it up there, I go, "oh, Vijay is playing well today." I'm not going to go "ooooooh." It's not going to happen.

Q. What did you learn out there today? You said you've educated yourself a lot. What did you learn today out there?

GAVIN COLES: Today? One shot at a time, the same thing I'm trying to learn every time, one shot at a time. I suppose I birdied 9 to go to 6-under and I sort of walked off the 9th green, going, "hmm, I'm 6-under, like this is new." Then I didn't hit a great shot on 10, so I just went back to hit it on the fairway, hit it on the green and go from there.

Q. Is this your best round competitively this year?

GAVIN COLES: No, I shot 65 in Tucson after a 66 the first day.

Q. What would you consider your greatest claim to fame?

GAVIN COLES: I don't know whether it's a claim to fame or anything, but actually catching my second son on the kitchen floor because my wife didn't quite make it to the hospital.

Q. Really?

GAVIN COLES: Yeah.

Q. Can you elaborate on that one a little?

GAVIN COLES: We've told this one a few times, but my wife actually said "my legs feel a bit sore" and at 4:30 in the morning she ran herself a bath, got dressed. I'm still getting out of the shower, getting ready to go to the hospital, not too stressed out about it. I'm not the one having the baby obviously.

She then grabs the phone, rings her mother, rings her ambulance and then sings out to me and said, "come on, we're not going to make it." So I come running out of the shower and obviously I'm not dressed, either. I said, "what do you mean, I'll carry you to the car." She said "we're not going to get too far." So I had to get dressed, open the front door for her mother to turn up. By the time I had undressed her the head was already out. I couldn't really go anywhere. By the time I sort of knelt down beside there, he said, "I'm coming into this world, look out." He's been that way ever since.

Q. Have you had any more kids then?

GAVIN COLES: No, we think after this one, the Everready Battery, two is enough. He's quite a fun kid. He's on the go all the time and he has been ever since he came out.

Q. What's his name?

GAVIN COLES: His name is Matthew and he's six. Just turned six, too.

TODD BUDNICK: If we can go through your birdies starting with the one on No. 2.

GAVIN COLES: About a 30-footer, I suppose, pin-high right. I hit a little 8-iron in there.

3, I put a Rescue in my bag instead of a 3-iron, and I hit that about 35, 40 feet behind the hole and I made that.

Then on 5, I hit it to about four feet, I suppose.

6, I hit it 12 feet, maybe 15, and then on 8 I hit it about ten feet.

9, I hit it about 15 feet.

I made about a 30-footer, I suppose, on 12, and I hit it to about two feet, three feet on 13.

Bogey, just missed the green in the right-hand bunker. Again, I was hitting my Rescue, my 3-iron into the green, and I hit it about two feet right of the green and landed in the bunker and didn't hit a good shot and missed a 20-footer probably. It was an ugly bunker shot.

Q. At what point do you get excited about where you are in the tournament?

GAVIN COLES: I think this is more nervous than actually playing out there for me since I don't do it very often. This is actually more nervous for me.

Q. Do you allow yourself -- at what point do you allow yourself to think of possibly staring down Vijay on Sunday?

GAVIN COLES: To be honest with you, I try to play 63 holes and give myself a chance, by the time I stand on the 10th tee to have a chance to win the golf tournament every week. That's how I try to play. When I play like that or not, that's how I try to play.

TODD BUDNICK: Thanks, Gavin. Good luck this week.

End of FastScripts.

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