VALERO TEXAS OPEN

September 25, 2003

Heath Slocum

HEATH SLOCUM: I did. I played very well today. I drove my ball well. I hit a lot of good iron shots and my putter was really the hot club in the bag, and I made a lot of putts and felt really good.

Q. Some guys were in here talking earlier, guys who shot 62, that 59 crept into their mind. Did you think about it at all out there?

HEATH SLOCUM: I was in a pretty good frame of mind. I was really one shot at a time. So I was worrying about each shot. It would have been nice to think about it, but I had a couple of shots to go. Coming into the thing, I was just trying to hit some fairways and make some putts.

Q. When you start the day with two guys already having shot 62, and a bunch of other low scores, does it change the way you approach your round, or do you try not to think about that?

HEATH SLOCUM: I did see, at the time Baddeley was at 8. I knew the course was yielding a lot of birdies. So just to go out and be patient and see what the course gives you and see what your swing and everything gives you that day. So I started out pretty well. My putter got going and from there it just carried on over all 18.

Q. What's the key when you're hitting toward unfamiliar territory to stay in the moment and not think about the score?

HEATH SLOCUM: I don't know. I just didn't think about it. It was nothing I consciously did. I was just there and just playing golf and trying to go as low as I can, trying to hit every shot to where I wanted and try to make the putt.

Q. Is this kind of a microcosm of what the Tour has become in a lot of weeks? You know you have to go as low as you can and you know you're dead if you make pars. Most weeks it's just kind of a microcosm of what you guys face?

HEATH SLOCUM: It's whatever the player wants, but I think players today are definitely just putting their heads down and going as low as they can no matter what the circumstances or conditions are like. I think players are getting better at it. If you see a low score it doesn't rile you. You know it's there, and you go out and try to play it.

JOAN v.T. ALEXANDER: Heath, can you go through your birdies.

HEATH SLOCUM: First birdie on 2, driver, 8 iron, made about 18 footer.

3, was a par 3, hit 5 iron to 40 feet.

4 is driver I can't remember what I hit on four. Made about a 20 footer on 4.

6, the par 3, hit 8 iron to about 5 feet.

7, I hit 4 iron, sand wedge, about 8, 9 feet.

11, I hit 3 wood, pitching wedge, made about a 20, 25 footer.

13, I hit pitching wedge to about 5 feet.

14, hit driver, 4 iron, just over the green, chipped it up to about 4 feet.

16, I hit 3 wood, pitching wedge to 20 feet, as well. So I made a lot of putts.

Q. You made some pretty good sized putts?

HEATH SLOCUM: Definitely.

Q. How was your putting coming into this week? Did you feel confident?

HEATH SLOCUM: My lines were good. I was struggling the last couple of weeks with speed, and today my speed was kind of perfect for me. I was hitting exactly the line I saw and the speed matched it, which was pretty important. It's nice to have those two.

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