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WASTE MANAGEMENT PHOENIX OPEN

February 7, 2011

Mark Wilson

SCOTTSDALE, ARIZONA

DOUG MILNE: We'd like to welcome the 2011 Waste Management Phoenix Open champion Mark Wilson to the interview room. This is I guess the second time in four weeks we've introduced you as a PGA TOUR champion in 2011. Obviously a lot is going for you quite well in 2011. With the win you pick up an additional 500 FedExCup points, puts you out to a pretty substantial lead in the year-long race and moves you up to 51st in the World Rankings, which is your highest ever. Obviously you've got to be elated about the way your year is starting off. Just some comments about the tournament this week and just kind of how that sets your mind as you move forward as we move on from this week.
MARK WILSON: Yeah, obviously Sony it was kind of -- I got in a lot of new tournaments, Masters for the first time, but then it opened up some uncertainty, am I going to get into Doral, am I going to get into the Match Play and all these other things, and I keep saying we've got to take a week off somewhere, where are we going to do that; in the middle there's Mayakoba and Honda, two tournaments that I've won. I'm not ready to take a tournament off that I've won.
Then I see the snowstorm up in Chicago, and it's like, why do I need to go back there? There's no reason. Let's just keep playing. So I plan to play -- right now the plan is to play through Bay Hill, take a week off, get ready for the Masters.
I'm just enjoying the ride here and that's just kind of the way I'm going to look at the year here, just ride this train as long as I can.
I was a little more nervous today than I was expecting. I didn't sleep great last night. It was probably the excitement with the Super Bowl and the uncertainty of today, and I just kept trying to rely on God to give me the peace that I needed to get through it. I prayed out there a lot, and I looked at the board with two holes to go and I saw Dufner had posted 18 so I needed a birdie. I got away with a bad tee shot on 18 but luckily got a good bounce and was hoping I'd finish it off there.
But the playoff was fun. Hit a bad tee shot as you'd probably expect. Hit the first one left; got to make sure not to make that mistake again, so hit it right. Made par, a two-putt from a mile away. That was an easy putt on 10. Just thankfully I started it on line and knocked it in.

Q. Obviously two wins in four starts --
MARK WILSON: Three starts, but who's counting. 67 percent, not 50.

Q. Is there something that's either clicked with your game or mentally that you can kind of pinpoint as to attribute to the success?
MARK WILSON: I think I've been a little bit better practicer. I've got a new green-reading technique that I learned from Dr. Greg Rose there at Titleist Performance Institute, and then Ping has been really good with me working with my wedges trying to dial in the grooves just right. I spin the ball more than most guys, so the whole groove thing last year was supposed to be good for me, but I still was spinning it back too much from the fairway. So Ping has been working with me good. I've got some good equipment now, and just -- but the putting really has been the big thing.
Dr. Rose helped me split the putts into two parts always, and that really has helped me see the line better for some reason. I started that. The first time I did that was at Disney and finished 6th and have had two wins since, so I'm just going with that.
I'm a quick learner in that sense. I've worked with Bob Rotella, too, and it just took me a couple days with him to understand what he was saying about the mental side of the game. And same thing when Dr. Rose told me this thing; when it clicks for me, I just take it and run with it, and that's what's really been good, that putting and working more on the short game and not stressing about missing tee shots or something like that.
The old Mark would have been pretty upset with the tee shot on 18 in regulation, maybe would have chunked that 9-iron into the front bunker and made bogey and handed the trophy to Jason. But the new one was just focused on, hey, I got this 9-iron out of the bunker and almost won the tournament that way. It's almost a two-shot swing a lot of times.

Q. What specifically is the new Mark? What kind of things?
MARK WILSON: Just the mentality I've been talking about, the new putting routine and then the practice rounds where I go out and I just really -- I try to throw a ball down inside 100 yards on almost every hole as an additional shot on the green trying to get that up-and-down. I almost don't even care about the shot I hit on the green during the practice round. I focus more on that short shot. Those two things have just really calmed me down, going, hey, no matter where I hit the ball I can get it up-and-down from inside 100 yards and therefore it's going to be hard for me to make bogeys. This week and Sony I eliminated the bogeys a lot, and that has been a key.

Q. Can you say more about how Bob Rotella altered your thinking?
MARK WILSON: Obviously I've always been a searcher in terms of my technique and my golf swing, try something new here or there, it might work for a little bit, and even switching during the rounds. When I saw Dr. Rotella, I said, okay, do I spend a few months and just try to engrain a new habit in the swing, trying to get my club a little more on plane, certain little things I'd like to change, or do I just go with it and trust it and try to just do the same thing every day. And he says, the sooner you decide to just trust what you've got, the quicker you're going to become a better player. And I skated right through Q-school and then I won three months later at the Honda, my first win in 2007.
And that was the mentality that I've taken ever since. I stray from that every once in a while, but for some reason at the end of last year, which was one of my worst years in recent history, it just popped back into my head, hey, I've got to just trust what I'm doing and just play my own game, not try to -- not put my swing on camera every afternoon after the rounds and try to make it perfect, because I looked around and I see everyone has got a different swing. And even some of the best swings on TOUR, if they can't dial in the yardage it's not going to help them. So just focus more on myself, and that's what Bob really helped me with.

Q. How soon were you able to catch up with the game last night and how nervous were you when the Steelers got the ball back at the end?
MARK WILSON: I was very nervous. It looked like dÃ©jÃ -vu from last year in the regular season when the Steelers marched down the field and scored in the last second a touchdown. I was a little nervous. I had my son watching it there with me, and I said, we need some defense. We were high-fiving.

Q. When did you --
MARK WILSON: Middle -- end of the third quarter, and I couldn't really watch it because I was -- I had to wash Lane's face and put his jammies on, and I had to eat, too. The chaos, with two little kids running around, I like the chaos, it's a good distraction. But at that time I want to at least get to watch the last 15 minutes of this game. This doesn't happen every year, the Packers in the Super Bowl.
Luckily my son after we played Candy Land in the middle of the fourth quarter, he said, okay, the last two minutes we can watch it together. So we watched that last stand, and I was happy that they somehow pulled it off.
I enjoyed it for another hour and a half watching SportsCenter, got the replay of the game and the celebration, some of the interviews, and I didn't sleep very well, like I said before, just because I think of that excitement and then the uncertainty of today.

Q. Who won Candy Land?
MARK WILSON: I did. I usually win. I don't let them win because it's a total chance game. He hasn't figured out how he can plant the cards just yet, so I usually win.

Q. Can you equate the nerves of watching the last two minutes of the game with the nerves finishing up the round today and all that? Is it remotely the same?
MARK WILSON: I'm more nervous, I guess, before I get started. Once I'm out there, and each shot I'm not as nervous as leading up to it. So when I was warming up, when I was getting here, in the locker room, I did something silly. My caddie has been picking me up all week and I left my wife with the car keys. I show up in the locker room and the car keys to our car are in my bag, so now she's stuck.
So I run out, I'm like, Chris, I hate to do this to you, I know I've only got 20 minutes, but can you run these back to her. This is not what I needed right now. So now my heart is beating a little faster. But once I get out there and hit the shots, I'm not as nervous as before.
You know, watching the Packers, I don't have any control over what they're doing. I don't know why I'm nervous. I guess just because I grew up watching games every Sunday. I don't understand the whole fan thing. But I do get nervous watching them because I want them to win. I know how much joy it brings to the people back there in America's Dairyland.

Q. I was out there on the 13th green when you guys restarted. Did you walk all the way out there with your caddie?
MARK WILSON: Yeah, we did that the other two days. We started on the holes over there, so we hit on the back of the range, and it's only probably a 500-yard walk. It's kind of a nice way to start the day instead of getting a cart out there.

Q. There had been some very brief talk about making this a 54-hole tournament with all the delays, and not taking into account how this finished, as a player would you have had a preference?
MARK WILSON: I don't think they ever would have done that because the goal on the PGA TOUR is to get 72 holes in, yeah, and if we go to Monday, that's fine. We're not going to go to Tuesday necessarily, but -- so no, I always figured -- there was no rain in the forecast so I knew we were going to play. When there's rain and iffy stuff like that like some other tournaments, then yeah, it would have been -- well, I wasn't leading, though, so I wouldn't have been doing a rain dance. No, I knew we'd have 72 holes to play.

Q. Did your thinking change at all at 17 after what happened with Tommy?
MARK WILSON: That was just unfortunate. He got a bad -- he was one behind me and he was due to hit a good shot, and he hit a really good drive there. I didn't watch it, but Bill Haas was like, good swing, Buddy. I was like, okay, he probably knocked it on the green. Then Tommy said, I think that's in the water. I guess that could have trickled over in the water there.
So no, at that point we had all that time, I happened to glance at the board and saw that there was another 18, so now no matter what Tommy did, I knew I still had to either par to get in a playoff or birdie the last hole, or birdie 17 for that matter.
It's unfortunate. Tommy played so well and he's a great player and a great character. Him and Bill were so much fun to play with. They both gave me a pat on the rear end there on 18 coming up to the green saying, "knock this thing in." So they were rooting for me.
Tommy has got a great attitude. I don't know what he ended up finishing. That triple bogey is going to hurt the -- he had such a great week. It's sad to see that. But hopefully he'll bounce back. Anybody know what he finished?

Q. I think tied for 8th.
MARK WILSON: Oh, good, top 10. That's good.
DOUG MILNE: Well, Mark, congratulations.

End of FastScripts

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