Interviews

An Interview With: HALE IRWIN

MARTY PARKES:  Good afternoon.  It's my pleasure to welcome the 1998 and 2000 U.S. Open Senior Champion, Hale Irwin.  Since you've won this event twice already, let's start in and ask you your impressions about the golf course and your impressions about your game coming into this week.

HALE IRWIN:  I'll go in reverse.  I think the golf course is going to be a very testing golf course, particularly if we continue playing in this humidity and heat, I think it's going to be -- not a survival test, necessarily, I think it's going to be a course that's made for the fittest.

I would hate to be out of shape and trying to walk around this place and expect to play the best of golf.  It's going to be a challenging golf course, to say the least, particularly the last few holes are very long.  And for a senior event, I think it will probably be decided in those last few holes.

My game coming in here, I've sort of picked up the pieces from Bethpage, and there were a lot of pieces to pick up, so I've been rather busy the last week.  But all in all not a bad year at all.  Bethpage exposed some of the problems I had in a big time way, but at the same time, I took away some good experiences there and it was a good preparation for this golf course.  I've heard some of the other players comment this week on how difficult this course is.  And I said you should have been up the road a couple of weeks ago.

I feel good, other than, excuse my sinus problem, but other than that I feel good.  The game seems to be in good shape, and we'll have to wait and see.  It's that kind of a golf course.  I think you're all going to be a little bit off balance all week.

Q.  What kind of advantage might you have here, given your level of fitness, and also the game that you're bringing here and do you think that you might have the same kind of advantage that Tiger had at a place like Bethpage?

HALE IRWIN:  In reverse, again, Tiger's great advantage there is he's fit, but he can hit the ball so very, very long.  And Bethpage for a high percentage of the players was just excruciatingly long.  There are a number of long hitters on the regular Tour.  A smaller number yet that can handle that length.  It's not like today's player, compared to yesteryear, if a guy was long he couldn't control it.  Well, today's player can control it, via technology, via better golf.  But I think the fitness part here, we didn't see the fitness part at Bethpage, because it really wasn't hot like this.  But this is a certain kind of -- the energy can be drawn out of you.  And I think it's important to stay hydrated.  I think it's important to be somewhat in shape, at least.  I don't think you can be overweight, considerably, not having played a lot and expect to do well here.  I think it's going to be very much of a taxing golf course.

Q.  Do you think that it eliminates a large percentage of the field, because of its length, because of the conditions, and just the nature of the Open, itself?

HALE IRWIN:  Well, just the nature of the Open, itself, I think eliminates some players, whether physically or whether psychologically, when they see the conditions under which we play open championships.  That could be said year after year after year.

As far as the golf course, I don't think sets up for any particular player, right off the bat, because it does have some shorter holes, but anytime a long hitter is keeping it in play the advantage falls to them, every time.  There will be holes here, however, that the shorter player, and this is what Bethpage did not have, there will be holes here where the shorter player can makeup some ground or at least close that gap, because it's not all ball beating, ball beating, ball beating.  There are a number of holes that are shorter, there are some that are quite long, 17 and 18 are particularly long.  16 is a long par-3.  So we have some good closing holes.

But to eliminate a good percentage of the field on skill factor, I think, is probably no more than it is any year.  To eliminate others on physical fitness may be greater, simply because we don't see this kind of heat and this kind of golf course that frequently, up-and-down the hills.

Q.  I wonder if you could talk in general terms about the state of Senior golf at this point, in terms of the Tour, the initiatives they announced last fall.  Do you see things changing and if so, for better or for worse?

HALE IRWIN:  Well, it seems like we're kicking this state of the game around an awful lot lately.  I think it's probably coupled inasmuch as we can see it thus far with the economy.  There are a number of sponsors on each Tour, each Tour, I should say with the LPGA, the regular Tour, the Senior Tour, that are struggling to keep up some of which reasonably say we're laying off people, we're not going to put money into it.  But there's an equal number of sponsors that are somewhat happy.

Now, the initiatives that we have gone to on the Senior Tour are helpful.  Could we do more?  Possibly.  What they may be, I don't know.  We're not necessarily pushing the inroads, but I think would we've gone to a point where we're expressing our desire to be cooperative with our sponsors and fans to see what we can do to keep the game in front of them and to show our willingness to be cooperative in whatever way we can.  It's still an entertainment mode from a sponsors perspective I think it's still a visibility mode, and they need that visibility.

Q.  Do you see any kind of push from players to drop the age limit a little bit to 45, 47 or do you think that most of the players out here are against that?

HALE IRWIN:  Well, I think everybody that turns 50 suddenly doesn't want to think about the 40's.  But, I think if you sit down with any player with an open mind, I think they would certainly discuss that number being dropped, whether it immediately goes to 45, that's another consideration.  Bear in mind that at the tender young age of 45, I won a U.S. Open.  So, it's not like you can't play.  And many of those players, the players of whom we are speaking about who are not 50 as of yet, can still play very, very effectively.  Should we open arms them on to the Senior Tour in one big rush?  I would have to study that myself.  I don't know what names you're looking at.  We can pull some out of the air, but it's still a little bit of a powder keg, because everybody out here has waited until 50.  But now with the landscape being a little different, I think it's important for us to examine that and say is it not time to at least discuss the possibility of dropping that Senior Tour age.

Q.  At about the age of 55 most seniors seem to stop dropping off a bit, they don't win on Tour as much.  You turned 57 a couple of weeks ago, and you're still a dominant factor on this Tour.  How do you explain that, when you turned 50, did you have those expectations, are you surprised that you've been so dominant on the Tour?

HALE IRWIN:  I have never really gotten hung up in that numbers deal.  I try to avoid the mirror.  I think if you get yourself thinking that, well, now I'm 55 or 56 or 52, whatever that number is, and the media told me I couldn't play anymore, you might start believing that, but I've never been that.  It's been more after a challenge the older I get to see if I can continue playing, and push it and push it.  And there's certainly a realistic point that you say I can't do maybe what I used to do as well, but maybe I can do something else better.  Did I, at the age of 50, expect to do what I've done?  No.  And it's maybe a roundabout way of saying I'm not surprised, because I have not felt that I was ever a lesser player because I'm 50 now versus 49 or at 57.

In fact, I've said many times, the best golf I've ever played was in 1997.  I was just a more complete player then than I've ever been.  But to say because I'm now 50 I am on the Senior Tour, and I'm not going to play those young guys anymore.  Well, I won on the regular Tour when I was 49, before I turned 50.  So, if you get hung up in that, then it may be meaningful to you.  I've ignored it, so I don't mean to be passe about answering your question, but I have just not been on that.  I want to say that I still have a lot to learn, I still have a lot of things I want to accomplish, and that's what keeps driving me.

Q.  Do you feel your strength of play, your dominance out there on the Tour is more of a mental mind set, are you stronger mentally than some of the other players out there or is it physical or a combination of both?

HALE IRWIN:  I think it's a combination.  I think you have to be mentally ready to attack whatever situation is put before you.  A lot of it is due to experience.  I've played a lot of golf.  I've played a lot of successful golf.  I've played golf poorly.  But I've learned from all those experiences.  And some of it is to know when to push it, what am I capable of doing together or this week versus what I was capable of doing five years ago.  There are shots that I still have in my head that I remember playing that were successful somewhere along the lines, and those shots are not always uncommon.  You may have them again.  And now, I think, can I do that one more time?  Can I do it again?  And you have to answer that realistically.  I face the challenges realistically and I don't dismiss them as I can't do that and I also look at it very objectively and say, is it the wise thing to do?  And I can't point out anything right now, but I try to approach the game as best I can mentally.  Ready to do what I can do.  And that makes it easier to then physically perform at the right level.  Sounds like a bunch of hog wash, but it means something to me.  I don't know if it does to you, but it means something to me.

Q.  If you had to quantify how many strokes more difficult Bethpage was than here, for you, how many, per round?

HALE IRWIN:  That's a bizarre question.  Well, first of all I didn't play well at Bethpage.  I wasn't playing well going in and I just didn't play well and it exposed that very quickly.  The weather on Friday was abominable.  Maybe 20 shots a day -- no, not really.  I think if I were to play my very best golf at Bethpage and my very best golf here, there would probably be a five or six shots a day difference, maybe.  That's just -- I have to explain that, because at Bethpage you're hitting long irons or fairway woods to many, many holes.  A couple of holes, No. 12 at Bethpage, which I couldn't get over the bunker, so I couldn't even reach that hole in two, so hitting a great 4-wood let's say to a green and making par might be just as good as hitting a 5-iron to a green and making a birdie.  So it's really hard to -- the two courses are not real comparable.

The rough is more difficult at Bethpage by a long shot, but it's also very wet.  The greens were comparable speed, but maybe faster at Bethpage, certainly a longer course.  I just think if you were to add it up, each nine, if you could play even par at Bethpage each day, each nine you'd feel very, very good about it.  Here, I don't know as that would win.  Here I think you'd be disappointed if you didn't go out and shoot one or 2-under each nine.  So add it up, I don't know what that is.

Q.  What's the difference for you in winning a U.S. Open and a U.S. senior Open, is there a difference in accomplishment, the way you look at it, the way you prepare for it?

HALE IRWIN:  Not really.  I know that my place in golf is at the Senior Tour level now.  I like to go over and say that playing in this U.S. Open was an honor.  I'm very grateful to the USGA for getting that invitation.  It's a part of who I am.  So therefore, to play a U.S. senior Open does not diminish that excitement level for me or the preparation.  The difference, of course, is a lot in the hype.  It's a lot in the expectations, I think.  We're not going to see any less exuberant crowds here, maybe a little tamer, but I think the people will enjoy the game just as much as they did at Bethpage, just the intensity level is not as great.  The numbers may not be as great.  But from a player's perspective, at least from my perspective, this is still the tournament to win, as far as I'm concerned.

Q.  With the course set up as difficult as it is, and if the weather continues to factor into it, I guess what is the beauty of seeing a bunch of guys just getting their butt kicked out there by the course, and where is the entertainment value in that?

HALE IRWIN:  It depends on what you call entertainment.  I say good golf shots are entertaining, if you're not capable of producing good golf shots, it won't be entertaining.  I don't subscribe to the theory that you have to make birdies for it to be good golf.  And I don't think the USGA -- this course is not as demanding as I think you might be implying it to be.  But on Sunday I played here for the first time and shot 65.  So, it's not unplayable.  If I can do that, there will be others that can do that.  What will rise above everything else are the complaints rather than the praises, and I think this is a very fair golf course.

In practice, we're playing all the holes from the very tips, so it's playing much longer than what we might see on Thursday and Friday.  So I think good golf is the winner always, and that doesn't always have to be a birdie in my book.

Q.  So with that, do you still think the course -- do you still think par will be the score here --?

HALE IRWIN:  I think it will be under par.  Now, how many under par, I don't know.  But I don't think that -- unless, again, weather.  If we have a lot of wind or something of that nature, but if it holds the way it is, I think you're going to see some good scoring, not necessarily real low scoring, but I think you're going to see some under par scoring.  There's enough birdie opportunities out there where it can happen.

Q.  The topic of fitness came up before.  Can you talk a little bit about your program, how you stay in shape and how much more does that come into play as you get further away from 50 and how much of an asset is it as you get older?

HALE IRWIN:  I think always physical fitness is important, in anything.  But I think when you're into a physical activity such as golf, and somewhat of a stamina thing.  People, I think, underestimate what it takes to play professionally and keep that focus, and being physically fit helps that focus over an extended period of time, not that you're exerting great energies, but you are doing it over a longer period of time.  I've always felt if I can stay physically fit and feel good about myself, feel like I've done the aerobics, I've done the weight lifting, I've done the practicing, I've done everything I can to get myself ready for the challenge of playing on a course like this, and conditions like this, and not be one of those guys that shoots over par, I might, who knows, but I think it's really important, because it makes me feel good about what I'm doing.

And ultimately, I'm the guy that controls things out there.  It's not my caddy, it's not my coach, which I don't have, there are other things.  But the program that I am on is not a prescribed program.  I don't have certain weights I lift or certain hours that I run.  When we leave here I'm going to go over and work out.  And maybe go talk to the Healthsouth people, and they can tell you.  I think I'm probably as fit as anybody on the Senior Tour.  And there may be people stronger or people that run longer or walk faster, but I think my combination of my physical strength and my mental strength has given me an advantage.

Q.  You alluded to accomplishments a few minutes ago.  What more would you like to accomplish in golf, what other goals do you have set?

HALE IRWIN:  Well, I want to play -- I'd like to win certainly this one another time, three and three has a nice ring to it to me.  I'd hoped to play a little better in our first major championship of the year, the Tradition, that's the Senior Tour's Masters, if you wish.  That would sort of fill that Senior Tour slam idea.  I create all sorts of little goals as I go through each year to keep me interested, to keep me going.  We always sit up here and say it's not the money.  Let's be honest, it's the money (laughter.) But it goes beyond that.  It's not just the money.  If you focus only on the money you're not going to get to the real achievement of holding this trophy .  If that's all you want to do is make money, but if you think of the challenges and the championships to win, the money comes with that automatically.  I don't want to be trite and say it's not the money, it is.  I don't play this for free.  If I was going to do anything for free, I'd go fishing.  But the goal I suppose would be to win this championship, to play in the U.S. Open next year and maybe shoot a little better than 82, 81.

Q.  On the accomplishments theme, have you found it disappointing, I know it's a pretty stupid question, your career speaks for itself, but are you disappointed that you haven't won any other majors, aside from the U.S. Open?

HALE IRWIN:  I think it's been a disappointment, yes.  I've had a couple of chances at the British Open.  I had maybe one opportunity at the Masters.  The Masters is always probably the hardest for me to win, just the way the course was set up and my game.  And the PGA was one in which I just never did seem to get it going there, a couple of times, but bear in mind that any of us that win a major in our career feel very fortunate.

But I think the U.S. Open was, when I was a youngster, that's what was in my mind, because I couldn't get into The Masters, I didn't know how you did.  I wasn't a professional at the time when I was a kid practicing.  And the British Open was something you never even heard of.  The only thing I could really get into was the U.S. Open championship.  That was always my goal, that was always my dream.  And it sort of stayed as my dream.  So I've been able to experience that dream three different times.  And the others would be fantastic, but I wouldn't trade any of the Opens for any of the others.

Q.  Do you have any comments in terms of Tiger's chasing the Grand Slam this year, now that he's got two under his belt and two more to go?

HALE IRWIN:  I'd love to be one of those players out there playing against him.  Tiger has just proven that he's clearly the best player in the world.  The point has been made before, but no one seems to be rising to that level that he plays to.  We're seeing players that may get close, Bethpage is a good example, when they got a little close, they fell back.  It wasn't that Tiger is surging ahead, they're not really in that mode of concentration or -- it's like they're folding.  He's clearly the best.  I don't -- I'm not saying that he's not, he is.  But I'd like to see somebody else step forward and shoot a low round on the last day to challenge him.  And no one is doing that.  They're just simply not doing it.  And whether or not it's psychological with them, I don't know.  I think it is.  Maybe some of the younger players out there are more intimidated by his presence than maybe some of the older players might be if they were in that same position.  I don't know, it's a strange phenomenon.

But I think the chances of him winning this year are excellent, because he's the best player.  But you have to have everything working for you.  It's something that I think he's very capable of doing.  But always in the British Open, that's a different deal.  If the wind comes up or so many things can go haywire at that event -- good chance, though.

MARTY PARKES:  Thanks for coming and joining us, good luck this week.

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