Q. 4-under for your efforts. How do you find it out there today?
LAURIE CANTER: Yeah, it played very good. Come here every year, lots of changes on the greens, very tricky to read and very tricky to commit to some putts.
Yeah, you can probably most of the time walk off this golf course, you feel like you left a few out there. I'm going to try and watch a bit now and see if everyone else missed the odd putt. I feel like the back nine obviously had a few that didn't go my way.
Q. I did catch a birdie and par putt from your round today and both of them resulted in a fist pump. You don't often see that on the first day. Just goes to show what this week means.
LAURIE CANTER: Well, yeah, you really putting me on the spot, aren't you. My friend used to say as a pro, you're not allowed -- as a pro, he used to say, you can't fist pump unless you earn enough to buy a house from the resulting putt. So he will probably be on me now that I've given that to you in the interview.
I've gotten off to slow starts in this tournament the two times I've played it and played my way into it. I wanted to start well. I like this course. It's a solid start.
Q. Some of the commentators are saying the course is gettable without the wind blowing, but it's still a monster with at this times difficulties and challenges.
LAURIE CANTER: Yeah, it's easier up in the commentary box for sure. I don't think it's a particularly easy golf course. I think you have to hit the fairway. If you're off the fairway, you're in rough. They are tucked pins. The bunkers have got massive lips. There's a big premium on hitting the fairway. If you hit the fairway, you can go at pins for sure. If you don't, you'll be hanging on to make.
I think as the week goes on, it will keep getting firmer, like it always does in this tournament, and by Sunday it can get quite spicy on the greens, and where they put the pins. I think for sure if you get out there early and get on a bit of a roll, you can get it going for sure. Yeah, the course demands good tee-to-green play.
Q. I want to talk to you about Eddie Pepperell, a friend of yours and no stranger to this tour, four birdies in his last four holes at Q-School earning his rights back here for next season. Tell us about what he accomplished.
LAURIE CANTER: It's amazing. I find it particularly impressive given what happened to him last year. Last year he missed by a shot, he double-bogeyed 15 and just missed a putt for eagle on 18.
I was refreshing my phone last year, and I was doing the same thing yesterday following him. I thought to kind of slay that particular dragon, what must have been going through his head. And to finish like that in a do-or-die situation is a pretty special thing, really. Probably I think anyone in golf who plays celebrated that and realised it, and from my perspective, delighted to have a mate back on tour.
Q. A lot of viewers will think the majors are the most nerve-wracking times, but for many players it's Q-School, the emotions and the high intensity. You've had your fair experience at Q-School. How would you describe that kind of environment?
LAURIE CANTER: I have a lot of ghosts. Eventually I framed it with kind of an opportunity mindset versus can't be threatened by the situation. But it's intimidating.
I think the hardest part of it is you have a leaderboard, and it will constantly say where 20th place is the whole week. So if you're right at that line, you get this big loss that goes through your system, I've got it; I've lost it; I've got it; I've got it. That's very unique to that tournament in golf.
There's no other tournament where it's so black and white, and frankly doesn't matter if you win by 13 or if you scrape home and you're the last to get in. It's the same for everyone and you get the same opportunity.
And there will be a couple of people every year that it changes their life -- generally changes their life. It's a really cool thing in our sport, other than possibly snooker is the only other sport I can think of that has a Qualifying School that's so black and white and to have a do-or-die situation.
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