Q. Can you talk about 18 and the great approach.
RORY McILROY: Yeah, I actually had a perfect lie in the bunker and it was just on the upslope and I was trying to take a little bit off a gap wedge and just got it a little bit heavy. But then, yeah, the third shot, it is sort of one of those in between, I didn't even know what the yardage was, but it's one of those in between ones where you're trying to eyeball it and pitch it somewhere between the front edge of the green and the hole, and thankfully it came out the way I wanted it to and it was a nice par save.
Q. Can you talk about the crowds here. They set a record yesterday, 28,000. Particularly around you, we followed you about three, four holes, the galleries, just how cool was it?
RORY McILROY: Yeah, they're amazing. As I said yesterday, that's one of the biggest things I remember from being here in 2018 for the PGA was just how many people showed up and what a great atmosphere it was to play in. Yeah, yesterday was amazing for a Thursday. Today, teeing off at 9:45 on a Friday morning and the people out there was incredible. Looking forward to more of the same over the weekend.
Q. How did the swing feel?
RORY McILROY: Maybe not as good. I hit a few loose shots. But as I said, it's going to be a work in progress, there's going to be days where it feels a bit better and going to be days where it doesn't. Today I hit some decent iron shots but was a little more squirrely off the tee. Hit a couple decent ones coming in. But, yeah, I'll go work on it a bit this afternoon.
Q. Saw you yesterday using the putter grip aid club. You were saying it helps your hands, but does that help eliminate a certain miss that you were seeing?
RORY McILROY: It just helps my right arm work better. Just the structure of it. Then the club gets more supported at the top. And then if I'm there I feel like I can really hit whatever shot I want. So it's more to help the right arm structure and sort of feel like keeping the right hand like on top of the grip more on the way back.
Q. Do you have it on a couple clubs?
RORY McILROY: Yeah on a lob wedge and on a 7-iron.
Q. First couple of days, from yesterday to today, the most difficult holes have changed quite a bit. Talk about the hole locations over the first couple of days.
RORY McILROY: Yeah, because the greens are so big you put a pin on a left. Like, for example, you put the pin on the left side of the green on 15 yesterday, and then you put it all the way up on right, like it makes it a completely different golf hole, or at least a completely different approach shot. So they can play around with the hole locations here a lot, which makes, which does make the holes play a lot differently, for sure. Yeah, I think it is just a, just because the greens are so big and you can tuck them away in little corners they start to play differently depending on where they are.
Q. Ludvig said yesterday this place reminds him of Valhalla or Quail Hollow.
RORY McILROY: Yeah, I would say more Valhalla than Quail Hollow. But, yeah, just these big modern sort of ballparks that I feel like the BMW Championship goes to a lot of them, PGA Championship seems to go to a lot of them. And they're, you know, typically courses that I've played better on throughout my career. Length is obviously a big factor. Yeah, so when I see golf courses like this, I like them.
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