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84 LUMBER CLASSIC

September 16, 2005

Stuart Appleby

FARMINGTON, PENNSYLVANIA

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Stuart, thanks for joining us, two rounds in the 60s. You've got the lead heading into the third round at the 84 Lumber Classic. Start with some opening comments.

STUART APPLEBY: Yesterday was a good solid day, played consistent through the day, just started off on the front nine not too great, dropped a shot in the sort of middle of that nine holes. I came home and I think I had six birdies the last 12 holes, so that was where obviously that round came from there.

And today, just good solid golf all day, more trying conditions than yesterday, and just made some good putts today. Of course it was more difficult; the greens were very firm, as usual, as just everything basically was a good solid day. I drove the ball well, hit the middle of the club face a lot of times, good club selection generally in tricky conditions, and here we are.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: A lot of the players that have been in here this week have mentioned that with the wide fairways that you can really unleash the driver, and really that's a big advantage if you can hit it straight and long this week.

STUART APPLEBY: Yeah, the fairways are reasonably generous, but they're only really generous if it's soft, and they're not getting any softer, so the ball is bouncing a bit more, which is where I was a bit concerned about that earlier in the week. The course wasn't quite too wet, but they've kept the water off it enough now where the gravity is pulling the ball off the fairway. 10 is a good example where it's almost impossible now to keep that ball in the fairway.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Were you a little nervous there at 16 on the drive?

STUART APPLEBY: Well, 15 and 16, good drives there. You've just got to catch a firm spot in the fairway and hit the right sort of shot. 15 was downwind and I hit a solid one there, really let that one go, and 16 I hit a good drive and caught probably a little slip strain down the bottom for an extra 20. Yeah, they were nice.

Q. How far on 15?

STUART APPLEBY: I had 116 into 15, and I had 150 into 16. I probably should have hit a 9. It was a whisker long. But yeah, it was a bit of a wait on that hole. Byrdie had a problem in the left so it was a long hole, so I was getting ready to hit.

Q. What do you think of the changes to the course and why we're seeing a lot of low scores?

STUART APPLEBY: I'll give you a good example. Last week in Canada was a good example of not an overly long golf course but tree lined and small greens, most greens between 22 and 26 yards, all generally round, which you can either design it as run off greens or you can design it with rough around it.

There's not a golfer that thinks small greens are easy. Big greens can be easy; you can get away with things. Look, it's the analogy, "these guys are good." We're playing against the best players so you're going to see some good scores. But I really think that the old style courses always present themselves with the hardest conditions to shoot low. I'm thinking of the Western as a good example, Cog Hill, Westchester is a great example of an old style course. You just grab those and any of the U.S. Open, PGAs can be like that if the rough is not obviously that's a bigger deal, but it's all based around the old style traditional layouts, and we don't play many newly designed old style courses.

Q. A lot of the players have been talking about the difficulty of this course this week, but when you look at the scores and the scoreboard, you don't really see that in the scores. Why do you think that is?

STUART APPLEBY: I'm not sure, because there were some good rounds this morning, and I'm sure the wind was blowing this morning. The wind was definitely blowing this afternoon. I don't really know. Good question.

I mean, I guess enough players are finding enough pin locations, and the greens certainly are firm. It's not like you jam it around the hole and just tap it in. You've got to work the ball in there.

I don't know, I think everything over the weekend, people usually run out of the blocks and they tuck pins a little harder and scores slow down over the weekend, so I don't think you'll see double the scores over the next two days. Depending on the conditions, too. It's totally weather dependent. It's drying out. But I really wouldn't have thought you would have seen this here, these sort of scores.

Q. 2003 you fared well here. How is this course different or similar?

STUART APPLEBY: Very different because they had the hurricane coming that was potentially going to dump on us. I remember looking at The Weather Channel when it was 50 to 100 miles east of us. We were going to get six inches of rain. At our locker room was a tent, and they said don't expect to come back and see this in the morning. We got lucky, but the course was absolutely soaked. We've got basically the opposite conditions this year, a bit of heat and a bit of wind, and they're definitely firming up. The scores, they were 20 something. I think maybe was it 22 under, maybe more?

Q. 22.

STUART APPLEBY: Yeah, it was easier then, target golf. The greens were not as firm as they are today. Being that these greens are new, they'll probably soften up as they get older.

Q. Are you surprised that they went back on 12, the par 3? Wasn't it 188 today?

STUART APPLEBY: No, it wasn't on the back tee, no.

Q. No, but it was 188.

STUART APPLEBY: Yeah. I mean, it's a weird green. There's two greens there, I don't get it. It looks like a pair of sunglasses. It's a bit weird. I don't know what Pete was doing there.

Q. With David Toms' situation yesterday, how did that play into anything for you guys today? You obviously were

STUART APPLEBY: I didn't really know about anything except he was off the golf course and Jerry Kelly was feeling a bit sick or something, too. I'm not a gossip mongor, so I don't know what happened there. Sounds like Dave has got the all clear, but I don't really know much. You could probably tell me more.

Q. Earlier today Chris Smith said he looked at the 9th hole at one point and said he didn't think he would be able to finish that hole. Talk about the

STUART APPLEBY: Who are you talking about?

Q. Chris Smith. I mean, he was fine there, just standing on the tee box looking at the difficulty of it. Talk a little bit about your perception of the difficulty of that hole.

STUART APPLEBY: 9, that's a changed hole from where it was in 2003. I think the tee shot is a better tee shot than what it was. Basically it's a blind second shot from 7 iron to 9 iron, depending where the pin is. The tricky thing is actually standing in the fairway and not seeing anything. You lose probably half the flags; you can't see them. That's the tricky part to that hole. But otherwise it's not overly demanding. The back tee is a different story.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Obviously you want to take care of business this week here at the 84 Lumber Classic. Next week is going to be a big week at the Presidents Cup. Maybe a couple comments about playing for The International Team.

STUART APPLEBY: Yeah, looking forward to next week, getting a look at the course again. It's been a few years since we've been there. I think there may be some changes. I'm not sure how much is different. I think the routing is different so they're spicing it up a bit, much like we did in Australia in 1998; at Royal Melbourne we changed the holes around.

Hopefully we have a good nice firm golf course and nothing too soft. I think that's really what most players are looking for. I've mentioned that many times in many interviews, that we'd rather see a firm golf course, so hopefully they'll let it get that way. It will be a great event. Last year it was definitely like that in South Africa.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Now that you've played several of them, do you feel like your role is changing at all as far as a leadership role? Are you becoming more comfortable.

STUART APPLEBY: I guess we're playing that every other year as Internationals, whereas the Americans are playing every year, the same sort of thing, so the rhythm of it is a bit broken up, a bit like the format. I'm feeling much more comfortable playing that type of match play situation. Match play is a situation where you need to win your matches and be aggressive, and I think that's something that I'm trying to use this week as preparation to play golf like that because that's really what it's about. It's about winning matches, not trying to shoot even par and hope someone else shoots worse.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Let's go over your score card if we could. First birdie was No. 4.

STUART APPLEBY: I made about a 30 footer there, and then the next is the par 5, no water, just lines. I hit it right, a very good drive down the right side, knocked it over the back of the green with a 7 iron and chipped down for a one putt birdie.

7, par 3, hit it a little bit right, probably about 20 feet from the hole off the edge of the green, chipped that one in.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: What did you hit off the tee there?

STUART APPLEBY: 6.

I had a great opportunity on 8, hit a good second shot, 7 iron in there that took a horrendous bounce to make it harder.

9, two putt birdie.

10 was actually very similar to the 1st hole, the first birdie. About a 30 footer I made there, 25 footer.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Did you hit pitching wedge, sand wedge.

STUART APPLEBY: Lob wedge.

Next is a par 4, 15 I had a good opportunity on the par 5 on the next.

The par 3, I had a good putt there.

Next was a par 4, 14, misread a putt there from about 15 feet.

Next, hit a good drive down there and made a five footer for birdie.

16, two putted from probably about 45 feet.

And a three footer on 17.

And a three footer miss on 18.

Q. What did you hit on 17?

STUART APPLEBY: I hit a good wedge, firm wedge.

Q. You thought the putt was in on 18?

STUART APPLEBY: Yeah, I definitely pulled it because in my mind when I hit the putt, I thought I hit it on line, but for me to miss it left, there was no way it was outside the hole. So I think the brain didn't quite communicate with the same confidence to where I thought I actually hit it. Normally when I hit a putt, I make it. Every player knows they've made it, and I guess I pulled it left.

JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Stuart Appleby, good luck this week.

End of FastScripts.

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