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AT&T PEBBLE BEACH NATIONAL PRO-AM


February 15, 2009


Mike Weir


PEBBLE BEACH, CALIFORNIA

MARK STEVENS: I guess we'll just open it up to questions right off the bat since you really have nothing to comment on your round today.

Q. Did you hit anything today?
MIKE WEIR: No, I haven't been out -- I've hardly been outside.

Q. What do you think of the decision to try to play Monday, being that you're in second place by four shots?
MIKE WEIR: I want to play. I'm glad that we're making -- that they've made the decision to play. I definitely don't want to call it. I want to play, definitely. Today, tomorrow, it doesn't matter, I want to play.

Q. What would make you not want to play?
MIKE WEIR: Nothing (laughing). I want to play. I'm here to try to win this tournament. I don't think there's anything, really, outside of lightning. This weather is tough on everybody, and it will obviously be a battle out there, but it would be a battle for everybody, and it would be kind of fun to see what happened. It would be probably a lot of ugly golf out there, but it would kind of be fun to see who could handle it.

Q. When the tee times keep getting pushed back during the day, does that mess up your preparation at all? Do you sit there and are you pacing? What's your day like?
MIKE WEIR: It kind of does a little bit. I've eaten probably four times already, kind of up and stretching and then it gets back another couple hours. Luckily I've got my wife and kids here and I've got my cousin and his wife and their two girls, so we've been able to have some fun, play some board games. I've got my dog here, take him down to the beach and throw the ball around a little bit. I've been able to do that a little bit in and out of the rain bursts.
But yeah, it's tough to wait around. It's good at least, though, that we're not waiting around anymore today, that we can just concentrate on getting ready for tomorrow.

Q. How different or difficult will tomorrow be to have waited through today and then if tomorrow maybe gets pushed back a little bit, what's that going to be like? What's the effect going to be?
MIKE WEIR: Well, it's difficult. I go back to when I won the Masters in 2003 we had a whole day off. I believe it was the first round on Thursday. You know, I was able to get off to a good start even though we had that whole day of waiting around.
I think in the course of one of the other rounds we had quite a delay. I don't know, I just think you need to not think about it too much. You just have to fill your time with other things, whatever that might be. Like I said, I think for me I've got my family here, and that helps. I mean, if I was by myself you might be thinking about it maybe a little bit too much. But you've got to fill that time with something, reading a book or doing something.

Q. What's your personal history in situations like this? Have you ever been in a tournament where the final round was canceled and it was a bad deal for you, or maybe taken advantage of it the other way?
MIKE WEIR: I've never won a tournament where a tournament has been canceled, the final round. None are coming to my mind right now that I've been in that position and maybe been rained out. There probably has been, but I just can't recall any right now. Maybe those tournaments where the final round has been canceled maybe I haven't been in contention or anything, so maybe it's not ringing a bell right now.

Q. Slow news days here, but did you say you brought your dog with you?
MIKE WEIR: Yeah. We've rented this house down here for the last four or five years, and the beach down here in Carmel, there's usually about 50 dogs out there running around, so we started bringing my lab down here the last couple of years, and he has a heyday. He thinks he's died and gone to heaven. He's out here running around with all the dogs jumping in the ocean. It's a vacation for him, too.

Q. I imagine this is not bad weather to play pond hockey in, but have you ever played in weather like this growing up?
MIKE WEIR: Oh, yeah. I mean, we played plenty of high school golf, played a lot of college golf. In Utah, I mean, we played -- I think three of the four years we played our -- it was called the Cougar Classic, BYU's college tournament, but it snowed, I think, three of the four years that we played the event. It's not quite snowing out there, but yeah, I've definitely played in a lot of bad weather, plenty of high school golf in rain and really cold weather.
You know, it's different. It's different. You're not as free, that's for sure, and you're not making nice big, free, loose swings like you might on an 80-degree day. You have a lot of gear on. You're gearing down a lot. Especially in wind like this, you're hitting a lot of little knock-down shots. You're having to play the game maybe a little more and thinking less about maybe what you're doing with your swing. You've got to just kind of find a way to get it in the hole and not worry as much about technique and things like that.

Q. Were you surprised I guess when you woke up this morning that it was going to be delayed since it didn't seem to be raining?
MIKE WEIR: Yeah, I was a little surprised. I thought, well, maybe with the rain they need to get -- I didn't know how much water was out there, get the bunkers ready. I could see maybe a couple-hour delay, but then when it kept adding on and you're checking internet and hearing that that tree went down, and talking to Brennan (Little), he was over there, my caddie, and he said it was just howling so hard over there balls wouldn't probably stay on the green. I kind of knew that -- well, although a couple hours ago it looked like it might have been breaking a little bit, but it seemed to blow right back in.

Q. Objectively how much of an advantage is it that you have sort of a history in bad weather growing up and such? Do you think that gives you an edge if tomorrow's round unfolds as planned?
MIKE WEIR: I don't know. I know what my comfort level will be. I can't speak for the other guys. But I know what my comfort level will be in there. I've always seemed to play okay in tough conditions. I can't speak for the other guys, but I know I'll be okay with it.

Q. You mentioned yesterday that tournament in Prince Edward Island you played where some tents blew over and you talked about the tree blowing down here today. Has there ever been a time when you've been on the course concerned for your safety? Does that ever enter into your thinking when you're out there?
MIKE WEIR: I guess the only time, a couple bad thunderstorms. Where I grew up in southern Ontario, the golf course was called Huron Oaks and had big oak trees around the golf course, and we'd get these big thunderstorms coming off Lake Huron, and if you got caught on the back nine in the trees with these big thunderstorms coming in, it felt a little iffy because you'd see the thunderbolts flying all over the place, so you made your way to the front end of the clubhouse. As a kid, three or four of us would be out on the course and bee-line for the clubhouse and stuff.
Out on TOUR they do such a good job when that weather is getting close to get us out of there, so I've never felt really on TOUR that safety has been an issue.
MARK STEVENS: Thanks a lot, Mike, for coming on.

End of FastScripts




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