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VALERO TEXAS OPEN

September 22, 2006

D.A. Points

SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS

PHIL STAMBAUGH: D.A., 65 yesterday and you shoot 66 today. The thing that jumps out on this sheet is you only had 24 putts and have only had 51 through two rounds.

Just a couple thoughts about your overall round today.

D.A. POINTS: Well, it started out terrible, could not have started out any worse, I don't believe. Just made a couple loose swings and couple bad breaks and I was struggling, talking to my caddie.

I think I 1 putted like the first five, six holes and I was three over par, which usually that is not the case.

But, anyway, I kind of got it together. I had a good drive on the par 5 and I kind of figured something out on my swing. I made a good up and down for birdie I guess on No. 13 14.

And so I kind of got me a little confidence going. I hit a couple nice shots on the next couple holes and 16, the shorter one, I hit a good 3 wood and lob wedge to about five feet and made it. Then 18, I hit another nice drive and a pitching wedge to about 7 feet and made it.

So I kind of it was nice to get it back to even through 9 holes so I didn't feel like I necessarily gave a ton back to the field.

Then I made the turn and started making some more putts. Just keep going in.

PHIL STAMBAUGH: Yes.

D.A. POINTS: 2, I hit a good 2 iron and had a really long second shot. I didn't realize how long the pin was. I hit it right on the top crest of this little hill and it turns out it was a really fast downhill putt and I hit turned out to be a perfect putt.

Had it not gone in it would have gone ten feet by. It went in and that was a nice little gift to kind of keep the momentum going.

PHIL STAMBAUGH: You how far?

D.A. POINTS: Probably 25 feet. I hit a good second shot in the middle of the green but it was right on top of the crest of this hill and going down the hill.

Then 4, 4 I just I hit another good drive up the left side and I hit a 9 iron to 6 feet and, 5 no, sorry, I take that back. That was 5. 5, I did that. 4 shoot, is it good when they run together?

4, to be perfectly honest, I don't remember. I think I hit it oh I hit it yeah, now I remember. I hit a driver in the left first cut of rough. Hit a little gap wedge up to about 12 feet and made it.

Then really I lipped one out on 6. I hit a great putt there and then 7, I hit a good drive and hit it to about 6 feet there and missed it.

And I think I kind of was looking a little bit ahead of myself there. I was like oh, make this one, get going really good. I made the one really poor stroke I made all day.

Then 8, I played the hole really well. It's a hole you can almost drive and I chose to hit 3 iron off the tee and hit a full lob wedge in to about I guess I hit it to 8 feet and made that and then 9, really key actually to not finish with a bogey.

I hit a drive in the right rough, worse lie I've seen all week, and hit it up just short of the green into another not very good lie and chipped it up to about 15 feet and made it for par. That was a huge par save there in the end.

PHIL STAMBAUGH: What happened at 11 on your start?

D.A. POINTS: 11, I hit a drive in the right rough and I only had 90 yards to the hole on a little bit of a down slope. The lie wasn't too bad and so I thought I'll just try to hit it about 70 yards and it came out a little hot and landed just past the hole and rolled all the way down this hill under a tree across the path.

Then I tried to hit it up the hill. It stuck on the hill. I tried to hit the next one close and it stuck on the hill. Fortunately, I got it up and down for double bogey.

Then 12, I hit it in the right rough and I had 190 yards in out of the right rough and there's a gully short so if you play for a flier, you can hit it in the gully.

If you hit a flier it goes over the green in the back bunker, which is where I hit it. I hit it on and 2 putted for bogey or 1 putted. I hit it through the fringe. So I 1 putted that one for bogey.

Q. We were talking earlier, your best opening 36 round score, this is I think 131 is your best by four, five strokes. I mean have you found something coming into here or have you done something?

D.A. POINTS: I've been playing well last three weeks. I went on a stretch where I missed like frigging every cut I played in. I don't even know how many in a row it was.

You don't have to remind me. My wife reminds me it was 8 in a row. She knows. She was keeping track. That's good, appreciate it, sweetie.

So I missed a bunch of cuts in a row. I started working with a new instructor Brian "Mogg" is his name, and kind of I made the cut at Boston and then actually, you know, I played pretty good I shot 3 under the last round in Vancouver to finish 20th and last week I shot 2 over on the weekend to finish 27th so I was in the hunt there.

This week I think just kind of I like the golf course. To me this is going to sound maybe arrogant or stupid it doesn't feel that hard of a golf course. If you hit it in the fairway it's how many birdies can you make?

Starting out I obviously didn't hit it in the fairway, that's why I got off to a bad start. If I can keep driving it in the fairway I feel really good about the week.

Q. What were your emotions between the end of the round yesterday and this morning? You were I think tied for the lead at one point for maybe I think

D.A. POINTS: I bogged 17. Yesterday I was as calm and quiet and just like I mean it was almost like I didn't even know where I was. I was real relaxed, kind of hanging out, just hitting a shot here or there. If I made par or birdie or bogey, I didn't even know.

I'd like to get back to that if I could, but today, you know, I had to dig down a little deeper and pull it out. Finally I could get in that comfort zone and get a little more relaxed on the back 9 after I got it back down and made the nice birdie on 2.

I was like, "Alright, now we're back in the red, we're headed in the right direction. Let's relax and go from there."

I'm just going to try this week I didn't even play a practice round. My luggage got lost. I played in a Pro Am Monday in D.C. My luggage got lost here.

We landed at 12:45 Tuesday morning and didn't have any luggage. I thought, well, you know, I'm just going to take it off. This is my fifth week in a row out so I've played a lot of golf so she and I went and watched a movie and went shopping at the nice mall and I thought, well, maybe I'll play 9 holes Wednesday morning. That was a shotgun. I couldn't do that. Maybe this is how I'm supposed to do it, warm up and just go play. And so far it's doing alright.

Q. Did you hit any balls at all Wednesday?

D.A. POINTS: Wednesday I played here last year so I had taken notes in my yardage book and so I basically played I played the holes on the driving range.

I just say No. 1, dogleg right, hit it at the bunker, you know, kind of thing, and played it that way. But didn't didn't actually hit one shot on the course until the first hole on Thursday morning.

Q. You said somewhere there on the first 9, "I figured out something with my swing." What was it and what not what hole but were you taking a practice swing, on the tee, off to yourself?

D.A. POINTS: On the 13th hole, the par 3 13 downhill, it's a little flip. Today it was like a 9 iron and I hit it right and it wasn't even close. I was like, "Man, you know, I almost fell over going forward like the my left side."

I was like I guess I'm getting a little bit ahead of it. On the next tee I said, "Let me just try to stay behind it on this tee shot, not feel like my weight gets going too much to the left" and I striped it right down the middle.

That kind then I noticed on another iron shot that I kind of felt like maybe I was my arms were a little too tense, and then on 18 I kind of tried to loosen up my arms on a pitching wedge and hit it righted dead on line about 6, 7 feet short of the hole.

I was kind of like okay, now it kind of felt like now I know back where it's going and it went straighter.

Q. So essentially on your follow through on those couple shots that's where were you noticing it?

D.A. POINTS: Right. Wasn't really a back swing thought. More of trying to stay a little bit more still and especially on the down swing not to get kind of sliding ahead of it.

Q. D.A, you mentioned that this course kind of lends itself to accuracy. The trend in courses is to hit it as far as you can.

Is this a golf course that you have to have placement a little bit more?

D.A. POINTS: No, it's not. Actually it's that's why its fun. You can drive like four par 4s especially if you're one of the longer guys.

I played with Scott "Mucheski" and Nicholas Thompson. They bomb it. Scott drew it 40 feet from the hole on 11 today. Most everybody in the field can drive it on 7 if they choose to go for it.

8, you can pretty much almost either get it on the green or in the front bunker if you choose to go that route.

Then 16, if the wind is in the right direction, you can drive it on that green.

So, really, you can get up and bomb it if you want, but at the same time it gives you a lot of risk/reward which to me I think is the most fun in golf when you have holes that if I want to go ahead and step up and try to squeeze in a driver and then maybe make an eagle or a birdie that way, that's great or I'll just go ahead and hit my 4, 5, 3 iron off the tee and try to wedge it in there.

So it depends who you are. So, you know, that's why it's a little bit of both.

I chose to be a little bit more on the conservative side today because yesterday I felt like I was just hitting it dead on line all day long.

So, I hit driver on just about every hole except No. 7 and then, you know, today it started off a little crooked so I hit a few more irons.

PHIL STAMBAUGH: Anything else. Continued good luck, D.A.

D.A. POINTS: Thanks guys. I appreciate it.

End of FastScripts.

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