THE MODERATOR: Welcome to the 2021 Volunteers of America Classic virtual media center. We are joined by current Rolex Rankings No.45, Stacy Lewis. Stacy Lewis, thanks so much for topping by.
STACY LEWIS: Thank you.
THE MODERATOR: One of your 13 career victories came here in 2014. Not specific here here, but...
STACY LEWIS: Yes.
Q. It was when this event was hosted at Los Colinas. Different venue, same great sponsor. What do you remember from the tournament? Is there some past champion thrills that come back when you arrive here at Old American?
STACY LEWIS: I don't have quite the best memories at Old American as I do at Los Colinas Country Club. Definitely more comfortable on the other golf course than this one. Just trying to really get more comfortable every time I play it. I do feel like that's happening.
But, no, just to be back in Texas, back with what's comfortable, just feels like you're coming home. So just looking forward to the week.
THE MODERATOR: What are the differences between Los Colinas and Old American?
STACY LEWIS: Everything. There is not really a whole lot similar about it. Your grasses are different. Los Colinas you had to kind of hit some shots to keep them in the fairways because of slopes, and this one you got to keep it out of the bunkers that are in the fairways. Your greens are really big and slopey here.
The one thing I loved about Los Colinas was the greens. They were probably the best greens we got to play all here year. I was pretty sad when we left there. Certainly glad that Old American has kept us in Dallas and keeps us coming back.
But like I said, I got to keep this golf course growing on me, I got to learn to play it a little bit better every time, and I think I'll get there.
THE MODERATOR: In 11 starts on tour this season you've made 10 cuts with a pair of Top 10 finishes. Where do you feel your game is at as we enter Old American and you continue to learn and just enter the second half of the 2021 season?
STACY LEWIS: I feel look I played solid. Definitely not where I want it to be at the moment, but I played solid, made a bunch of cuts, like you said. I've had one or two good days and then a bad third day, taking me out of contention.
So right now I'm just trying to -- I want to keep -- get the bad rounds better so I can stay in contention. I think I'll have always have the good rounds. It's just minimizing the mistakes and just trying to keep doing little things just a little bit better.
THE MODERATOR: Your only missed cut came last week at the KPMG.
STACY LEWIS: Uh-huh.
THE MODERATOR: When you're having a pretty consistent year as you have been having and you hit a bump in the road, what's the greatest thing you rely on to overcome adversity on the course?
STACY LEWIS: Just my drive. You know, it's just I was talking to my husband on Friday night, and I think he thought I needed like a pep talk. And I'm like, no, I'm mad. I don't need a pep talk. I was back out there on Saturday working on it. That's just who I am.
I'm not going to quit or feel bad for myself because I miss a cut. That's when you got to go back to work and figure out what you did wrong and try not to do it again.
THE MODERATOR: Speaking of your husband, earlier this month it was announced that Jared will be taking over the women's golf program at A&M.
STACY LEWIS: Uh-huh.
THE MODERATOR: He coached Houston to eight AAC Championships.
STACY LEWIS: Uh-huh.
THE MODERATOR: Pretty impressive number. College Station is a little ways up the road. What's the transition been like for you and the entire family in this next step of his career?
STACY LEWIS: Life is a little crazy off the golf course right now. Two weeks ago we found a house, put an offer, got it accepted, so closing on a house in two weeks.
Trying to figure out when we're going to get movers and sell our other house. For him, he's on the road recruiting like crazy right now, and so out schedules are a little bit all over the place.
But maybe by Christmastime we'll get settled in our now house with all of our schedules. But just kind of doing the best we can and getting through this busy -- for me it's a busy stretch of the summer. I'm playing five in a row.
For me, I'm trying to be here, and if there is stuff I need to take care of at home I do it, but just trying to focus on this right now.
THE MODERATOR: Is the housing market as crazy in Texas everywhere else?
STACY LEWIS: Yes, it is. It's insane. The house we picked got eight offers in three days, and luckily they picked ours of so we have a house.
THE MODERATOR: Wow. Yeah, good. Step one.
STACY LEWIS: Yes.
THE MODERATOR: Questions.
Q. Stacy, with Angela's win last year being the last player over 40 to win on the LPGA, how important is it from your perspective for the health of the tour to have players in their 40s be in contention?
STACY LEWIS: It's funny you ask that. My mom asked last week, she's like, who is older than you on tour? We could only come up with a handful players.
It's important. Your veterans are the ones that have been around through the highs and lows of the tour. Just for the health of the tour and keeping things going in the right direction, especially as we have a new commissioner, it's important to have the veterans around.
We were at a little practice thing on Monday and some of the girls left bottles on the ground. Angela is over there picking them all up, throwing them in a trash can. So it's little stuff like that of setting a good example for the younger players. At some point we're going to hand the tour over to them and they need to know how to do it like the older players taught us.
Q. How did the older players teach you when you joined the tour?
STACY LEWIS: You know, it's just by the conversations, by the way they interact with sponsors. And they showed me how important Pro-Ams are. Pro-Ams are huge for our tour. You know, I think that's something that some of the younger players don't get.
They see it as a hassle and it interferes with practice, but it's the most important day of our week. So it's little things like that of what sells our tour and what really makes it work.
Sometimes it takes a downturn in our tour or the economy for the younger players to see that. So hopefully we can spread the word about just we have to make our tour better as an whole.
Q. And you mentioned being one the older players on tour. How difficult is it to contend as you're getting older on the LPGA?
STACY LEWIS: It's hard. These girls are so good. They're so good so young and hit it so far. I think that is the biggest thing right now, just the distance part. I'm not going to magically make a swing change and hit it 30 yards further. That's just not going to happen.
For me right now I'm trying to get my short game and wedges and putter as good as it can be. If that's on, I can contend, be in contention, and play smarter than everybody else, too.
But it's really hard. These girls are so good. But it's great. Our tour is in a great spot, and it's nice to watch Nelly. What she did last week to that golf course was unbelievable.
Q. I want to go back to what you learned when you said you went back out on Saturday and tried to learn something. What did you learn?
STACY LEWIS: Yeah, that I wasn't as far off as I thought it was. We been working on the golf swing, working through some things, and I think we kind of worked -- it was setup related, so fixed a couple things in setup, and then the grip. It was kind of a chain of things that were wrong.
And the last thing was just getting my body to move around versus kind of sliding forward.
So, I mean, that was the main culprit. I been putting and had been putting and chipping really good up until the last week, so I think I've been kind of getting away with it with the golf swing. The putts just didn't go in.
Danielle, I played with her the first two days and I saw her on Sunday and she was like, I didn't want to say anything during the round, but I've never seen so many putts lip out or be on the edge. Well that's probably a good thing you didn't say it during the round.
It was one of those weeks, but it wasn't that far off. It's just I can't just take a weekend off. That's just not me.
Q. So the practice session for the Solheim Cup, did ya'll play golf or was it mostly other sports?
STACY LEWIS: No, we did not do any golf. I came out here yesterday after -- I flew in yesterday morning, played nine holes, and my body hurt in places that hadn't been hurting in a long time. (Laughter.)
So we kind of had broken into teams and played some various games. Pickleball, which Amy was super excited about. Played badminton, which was hilarious. Different like archery. The coolest thing is they have a shooting range there at Reynolds, so we got to go shoot some shotguns and fish.
Few of us jumped in the lake. It was everything other than golf.
Q. Why is that important?
STACY LEWIS: It's important just for everybody to be together, and we were missing some people, but for the rookies and first-timers and girls that haven't played a lot on Solheims, it's great for them to be comfortable with everybody, just to see us cut loose and get out of the golf stuff.
Because we all kind of -- when you get to the golf course it's business, it's work. So just to kind of see people cut loose a little bit. We got Angela to jump in the water with her clothes on, which she's like, I don't know how you guys got me to do this.
But it's great for the younger players to see that and see them cut loose. Helps everybody just feel more comfortable when it gets to Solheim week.
Q. I guess the last follow up is did you discover any hidden talents trying all the other sports?
STACY LEWIS: Well, not in myself. Jennifer Song and Brittany Altomare are very good at archery. Figured that out. Who else? Amy was really good at shooting. They played distance darts at the of the day of day and Jennifer Kupcho was really good at that time.
Q. Good stuff. Thank you.
STACY LEWIS: There you go.
THE MODERATOR: You were the last American to reach No. 1 in the Rolex Rankings before Nelly reached the top spot with her win last week. You spent four weeks there in 2013, 21 weeks in 2014. We've all had this front row seat to Nelly's professional career.
First off, what do you think just looking at the state of Americans in the women's professional game, what's the state right now?
STACY LEWIS: I mean, I think we're in a great spot. I'm not just saying that because she's No. 1 in the world. I think we've seen this with Nelly that it was coming. She just needed to get a little bit more comfortable with the pressure on and how to handle it.
But she's got the attitude to be there and to stay there. She's got this little bit of extra drive in her and obviously super talented. Can overpower a golf course. Putts it great. I mean, if you were going to -- if you gave me a handful of American players, she would be the one that I would pick out that would get to No. 1.
I think it's great for our tour. Sunday was great for our tour, just that battle between her and Lizette, just to show that there is two different ways you can play the game and still play it pretty darn good.
I'm excited for Lizette because I know she's been struggling, so it was a good day for our tour on Sunday.
THE MODERATOR: What do you remember about time at No. 1, and is there a different type of pressure week in week out when you sit at that top spot?
STACY LEWIS: Yeah, absolutely. It's a way different pressure. You work so hard to get to that spot and then it's kind of that realization, okay, what do I do now? What do you do to stay there. It's not anything -- any secret. You just have to keep doing what you're doing.
Your time goes away, you're pulled in a lot of different directions. Everybody is going to ask a lot of your time. That's the hardest part, is you don't really have much time yourself.
I think Nelly is taking a few weeks off, which I think is great. She deserves it. If I won two weeks in a row I probably take a couple weeks off too. She more than deserves it.
I think that's something I wish I would've done a better job of, is really enjoying the wins. I did celebrate them, but a lot times it was right back into work. My message to her would just be enjoy the heck out of it. You deserve it, you worked hard for that. Enjoy it these couple weeks and then get ready to go win another one.
Q. I want to go back to just Lizette for a second. When you heard I guess what she said early in the week and on Sunday she considered retiring even, thoughts on how important it is when players are open up like that and share that kind of a message, how inspiring that can be?
STACY LEWIS: Yeah, I think some of us knew that a little bit of something was going on, but you also don't want to kind of poke too much and make her upset. But I think it was great that she talked about it. I think it's refreshing. I think we get so caught up in what we're doing and don't want to tell anybody else what's wrong with us or to look weak or to create a competitive disadvantage or anything like that.
So I just think it's great that she said what she said, and probably helped her play better just to get it out there and relax a little bit. But I do think -- you know, just she came straight from the golf course to Reynolds and she had a big ole smile on her face and was happy as can be. That's the biggest thing, is you want to see your friends happy. Golf is golf but, if they're happy, that's even better.
THE MODERATOR: They say everything is bigger in Texas. Just how welcoming is it for you to compete in your home state over an Independence Day weekend to celebrate, like we talked about, the state of golf for Americans and just also celebrating 125 years now of service by Volunteers of America?
STACY LEWIS: Yeah, so I was a little bit jealous of the people that are going to be out on that lake this weekend in their boats and having 4th of July parties and we're going to be sweating it out on the golf course.
But I love playing in Texas. I love being back home. This is the weather and the grass and everything that I grew up on. We're comfortable here.
We need to keep a tournament in Texas for young kids coming up to come out and watch us play and have the aspirations of being here more than anything.
There are so many great players that do come out of the state of Texas that we need to continue to build that. Volunteers of America, we can't thank you them enough for keeping us coming back.
I don't know, it's really special I think for any players from the state to play in Texas. So we're just excited to be here this week, and we're going to go sweat it out this weekend.
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