Q. How do you reflect on your final round 68 as a whole?
PATRICK REED: It was a little sloppy today. Didn't quite hit the balls as well as I wanted to, and I couldn't quite figure out the speeds, so a lot of careless errors early on and throughout round. But besides that, I was able to ride the ship and able to hit quality shots down the stretch, and I was able to finish correctly, finish strong.
But you know, the good thing is there's a lot of positives this week. I felt like I did a lot of things better than I have the past couple weeks and so the things that I'm working on definitely give me confidence going forward that I'm doing the right things and going in the right direction.
Any time I can come over and play and support The European Tour, and also to come over and play the way I did this week, definitely makes me feel good and makes me feel good when I go home.
Q. You all speak highly of The European Tour, and coming over this time with everything that's going on, it must feel a little different, how do you reflect on the whole experience?
PATRICK REED: Really I think the biggest thing for me was there of course was a level of concern coming over. It had been pretty to kind of stay at home and not have to hop on a plane and fly that long, and I knew I was going to be taking a risk but I thought it was a calculated risk that needed to be taken.
When I got over here, I actually felt safer over here in our bubble over here than we have at home. Literally the guys can only stay at two hotels. From there you're eating either at the hotel or at the golf course, so once you get into the bubble here, you're in the bubble, and so once I knew that, once I got over here and got inside this bubble, I knew it was going to be a great week and it was going to be -- safety-wise, it was going to be perfectly fine. The biggest thing was trying to get over here and make sure I got over here safely.
Any time I come over, I'm always pleasantly surprised. Of course you always expect bad weather, and the weather before I got here said it was going to rain every day, said it was going to be nasty and we only had a little bit of rain here and there. That being said, it was awesome to come over. It was definitely worth coming over, and I can't wait to come back.
Q. What are your plans between now and teeing it up at Augusta?
PATRICK REED: Biggest thing is go back and talk to my team and coaches and figure out what our game plan is, kind of making some swing changes right after the U.S. Open and finally putting it underneath the gun during tournament play and seeing some quality shots out there, seeing some things that I haven't seen in a while and seeing some consistencies that I can kind of work on and build off of. As a whole I felt like it was great and that there was a lot of things that we could take from this week moving forward, especially once you get to Augusta, it's going to be cold and kind of damp. That being said, I feel like it was a very successful week for us, not just here this week but also going forward.
Q. Fourth round 68 and with another eagle, summarise how you feel you played this week.
PATRICK REED: For the week, I feel like I played pretty solid. Today was a little sloppy. Today there was some tee shots, some iron shots that were careless and some putts that were just not very good. But that being said, there was a lot more good than there was bad and whenever you can do that, especially after making a swing change, things like that, it definitely showed that I was doing the right things and moving the right direction.
I think that's the biggest thing is I feel like actually getting a tournament under the belt with kind of a newer swing, and coming out, finishing -- I think I'm going to finish hopefully third, is very positive. It's something that I have to continue to build on and I know it the right direction I'm going on, especially the way I was able to play.
Q. There was a feeling early on, it might be giving up more birdies than the rest of the week on the course today?
PATRICK REED: If there was a day you felt like you were going to get it, even though it was a Sunday, was today. The wind was down and the temperature was up a bit. The direction the wind was out of it, made basically 1 through 5 shorter, and 6 and 7 are shorter holes as it is; same thing with 8. So you don't really worry too much where the wind direction is on those. I felt like the wind direction today and the calmness of the wind was a day that you can go out and probably shoot -- if you get hot, shoot a real low number.
Unfortunately was just a little sloppy there throughout day where I couldn't get enough close and hole enough putts.
Q. You picked up some more valuable Race to Dubai points going into the end of the season.
PATRICK REED: I think that was the biggest I think this week is coming over and testing out my golf game, but also at the same time, trying to hold that top spot, because you know, the biggest thing was to come over and show support, play some good golf and hopefully by the time we get to Dubai, that we're in the driver's seat and everyone is having to chase me. There's a lot of season left. You still have some European Tour events, but then you also have Augusta and I'm sure there's a lot of points there, as well.
That being said, it's far from over. You have to continue playing solid golf and continue playing well and you need to play well at the big events, too.
Q. Tell us how this week has been for you. Obviously since the Tour has restarted and we have this situation, I wouldn't be surprised if your advisors might have a question mark about you coming over, but you've embraced it fully?
PATRICK REED: I think that was the biggest thing. We, as a team, and the family and everything, we sat down and we've always wanted to come, we've always wanted to show support, especially with how awesome the event was last year and being my first time playing here, we were trying to figure out the best way we could where it was safe for myself because at the end of the day, there's responsibility when you fly over, especially when you have COVID going on and everything. If we fly over, we make sure that we're not putting other people at risk and that was the biggest thing is not coming over here and putting everyone on The European Tour and The European Tour at risk.
Biggest thing is make sure we got over here safely and same thing going home, make sure that I'm feeling well, make sure everything is going all right so when I go home I'm not putting my family at risk.
So far, we are three-fourths of the way there. Our team was able to figure out a great game plan with The European Tour and everything to get over here correctly and safely, and ever since I got over here, I felt great. The way everything is run over here, the protocols and everything that the tour has lined up here, made my whole team and everybody feel really comfortable and once we got here, it was basically we felt like all we had to do was focus on golf which is what you want during a time like this is to go out and focus on golf rather than everything else in the world.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports