THE MODERATOR: How would you assess your round today? What was working for you?
JORDAN SPIETH: It was a very nice start. I felt like I've had some tournaments this year where I've gotten off to these nice starts early in the first round, front nine, and then we play difficult golf courses or I just hadn't really held it, so I remember I went to Michael during the day today and just said, Let's set a new goal, let's pretend we're starting over just to stay aggressive, just to kind of seeing holes to make birdies versus seeing holes for how hard they are, if that makes sense. So it was a good strategy. I don't foresee 7-unders every day, but when the wind was down to start, it was a good time to try to take advantage. And the greens were soft enough and not quite fast enough to where if you were controlling the ball off the tee you were going to get some looks.
Q. Even for the people who have seen it before it's a very different place than 2016 and you only played nine?
JORDAN SPIETH: I played nine on the back nine on Tuesday but then the pro-am yesterday where you're not exactly practicing to the holes.
Q. How do you pull a 65 out of it? I know it wasn't blowing that hard, but still it's long?
JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, but it's not super tricky. During the pro-am you're still looking, all right, here's this corner. Michael is saying, Hey, check this is out. This pin will be in the middle of the greens in the pro-am, and you're like there were some I wanted to see and write down the grain changes, when you're hitting a wedge into this one, just nerdy stuff that helped knowing on a few of the pins. It's not tricky, so it was more just getting back out and recognizing what do I need to prioritize on the range, what shots am I really going to have throughout the week versus others. And you have quite a few long irons, more long irons than I think you have a lot of other places and so I've been trying to prioritize kind of up the bag getting good control of those clubs and I did today. I didn't love some of the swings I made but I was able to kind of put 'em in the right spot and I made some really good swings as well.
Q. So with the wind down early was the distance really just the toughest challenge for today the first day?
JORDAN SPIETH: Well, what do you mean by that?
Q. The length on certain holes.
JORDAN SPIETH: Oh, sure. Then it shortened others, the ones that would have been into. Yeah, it was kind of moving around. It started kind of west when we started and now it's southeast. So you had to pay attention to try to pay attention to what it was doing and commit to what it was doing. Because although the greens are big, the areas that the pins are at are super small. So if you had a good number it was attack, and if you didn't it was play it to 20 feet and go from there. I knocked a couple putts in from the fringe which is a bonus, and the rest of the round I just played really the right way. So kept the ball in front of me, which will be key the next three days.
Q. (No Microphone.)
JORDAN SPIETH: Just seeing what you've seen the last couple days. I didn't --
Q. They made it official themselves. From your standpoint, however this plays out, do we have a sense of how these guys should be able to find their way back over here when the time comes?
JORDAN SPIETH: I'm not sure. I'm not sure if it should be the same for everyone. I know olive branches were given out, you know, a couple months ago. Brooks took 'em up on it. So I'm not sure what would now change. Obviously with, if it -- and I don't even know, that doesn't necessarily mean that LIV's not going to still move on, too. I think there's just too many unknowns for me to have a good gauge on what would happen there. But I think, if there's a system for Brooks and a system for Patrick Reed, does that stay the same for guys in the same category as those two coming back or does it change now. Does it change for guys who sued and dropped their membership. There's just a lot of different things that happened over the last four years for that. I'm kind of glad I'm not in that room, and I trust the guys that are in that room to make the right decision.
Q. I wanted to ask about your gear us sets up. I noticed that you hit quite a few balls on the range on Tuesday, 190 to be exact. And I heard maybe there might be a new driver, 3-wood.
JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, I put a new driver, 3-wood and golf ball in.
Q. Can you talk about it a little bit.
JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, so I've been spinning a lot the last year and a half on the range. I just thought it was a driving range thing. And I've been taking my monitor on to the golf course and trying to see. Then I had, I don't know, maybe a dozen shots I could tell you in the last year or so that came off just odd for an iron, spinny, ended up short. So finally I was like, you know what, it was Hilton Head week. I couldn't take the launch monitor on the course at Augusta, you're not allowed to in the practice rounds. So Hilton Head I did, and I just saw it happen, and I had a couple shots cost me what I thought were perfect shots kind of, you know, occasionally the first few you're going to think, oh, it's coincidental, there's a wind or something like that. But it was enough of a sample size to say let me explore other options. I had caved a 3-wood in in Tampa, so I was on the hunt for a 3-wood anyways. Then when the new driver came out I just kind of hit it some at home and then I did a lot once we had a week off and I was like, man, this thing's awesome. So aim really excited about all three. I played, I don't remember if I played the ball in hill top head or if I bailed and said I'll wait until the off week or not. But I played some rounds at home.
Q. And you switched from the X?
JORDAN SPIETH: Left dash X. So they have two Xs that they sell now, and it's one of the other ones. The left dash. It's just a lower spinning ball with the same height. I've always played the highest pin spinning ball because I thought I needed it in the long irons. Now with this whatever my makeup is and then just kind of added speed my spin rates have been fine if not too high. So it's actually kind of nice to be able to drop it down a little bit.
Q. With the woods, did you keep the similar shafts?
JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, being I just matched my 3-wood to my driver shaft now, so it's a different shaft and then I also went to a different head shape. I was in the TSR 3 and now I'm in the GTS 2. So I'm not sure if that's a winner yet. It's kind of a trial run. I didn't hit it great today so I'm going to go hit a few on the range and continue to fall in love with it.
Q. (No Microphone.)
JORDAN SPIETH: No, this would be, a ball change would be extremely rare. I did ball change in Palm Beach last year, so I did that mid season, but I did it to a ball that was a little more similar. I went from the '21 to the '25 X. And those balls weren't super different. This is a little bit bigger jump. But I hit enough shots to feel confident that it was better for me than what I was playing.
Q. How big to bounce back on that shot on 13?
JORDAN SPIETH: It was great. I hit it on the green I was like Mike, I don't know why that 4-iron was easier to hit than my sand wedge straight down wind from the middle of the fairway it's just like golf's funny. But that was big. That was a stolen one there, and I felt like when you're, when I'm, if you told me I was going to play 12, 13 even on 12 tee you would probably take it. So, you try to kind of put things in perspective like all right, let's kick start my momentum back in gear.
Q. What would you say would be the most challenging part for today, your most challenging part?
JORDAN SPIETH: Of today? Just have to stay really disciplined. Like you may hit a shot that something looks like can you get at a pin because the greens are big you just have to play away from it when you're in the rough or something like that. I think it's just, out here or any really hard golf course it's just recognizing that the par is a score and that's hard most of the courses we play it's a sprint. So when you're playing well you want to keep doing that, but you got to take your medicine sometimes. So I did that okay today.
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