Q. Justin Hastings, low amateur in your first U.S. Open here at Oakmont. First U.S. Open appearance. Just talk to us about what it means to you first to earn the honor.
JUSTIN HASTINGS: It was such a treat just to be able to play in the U.S. Open and then let alone have the success to be able to call yourself low amateur, it's something I'll hold onto for the rest of my life.
Q. You earned your spot in the field by winning the Latin America Amateur Championship in January. Could you just talk about the significance of the championship to you, to the region.
JUSTIN HASTINGS: That tournament, I can't even describe it with words how big it's been for me, and everybody really. I started playing that tournament when I was 14. I played seven times, I believe, maybe six. I may have to be checked on that.
Then to finally win it in my last year as an amateur, that tournament is marked on the calendar every year for everybody in that region, and it is for a reason because there's no time of year you get to play with that kind of thing on the line. It's been unbelievable.
Q. I'm sure today wasn't exactly what you would have liked to finish off, but still overall, making the cut, meeting a lot of name pros, such a tough golf course. Can you put it into perspective, maybe how good this was for you and what you maybe learned about yourself?
JUSTIN HASTINGS: Yeah, I think I've said it coming off the course every day, there's been a lot of good. There's been a lot of good. Today I played a very similar round to the ones I did the first three days and just had no luck on the putting green.
Yeah, I played to what I know I can. I played solid all week. I wish I could give you more than that. It was just a solid week overall.
Q. After the Open and you go to Canada, what's realistic as far as what you think you can achieve? Are you trying to get out of the first stage of Q-School? Are you trying to get on the Korn Ferry Tour? I'm sure you've probably taken a peek at what you can maybe accomplish in a short time.
JUSTIN HASTINGS: Yeah, a little bit but not so much. We've been so busy the last little while, there's been a lot of focus on what's been kind of going on week by week, so I've been trying not to look too far ahead.
Obviously the easy answer is we want to get on the PGA TOUR as soon as possible. My coaches like to say that good golf takes care of all that, so we're going to focus on playing as well as we can, and when we get opportunities the next few months hopefully we can take advantage of it.
Q. You said yesterday that you were not focused obviously on the low am. There was still golf to play. When did you let yourself realize the accomplishment? Was it the 72nd? Was it just coming down the path?
JUSTIN HASTINGS: I would say right about now when I was told to turn right out of scoring to come talk over here. It's a tremendous honor. Like I said yesterday, though, if you're thinking about it out there, you're going to get beat up pretty good.
I tried to do a good job of staying in the moment and staying focused. Now for the next little while, I can start to think about that.
Q. What did you hope to learn about yourself versus what you did learn about yourself this week?
JUSTIN HASTINGS: Again, I think it's just a lot of reassuring things that I've known/thought about myself for a while, and that is that I can compete out here with my good golf game -- when my golf game's good is what I mean. Yeah, I think I was just reaffirmed that, when I have my golf game, I can kind of compete out here.
That's something I'm going to take with me in the future, and hopefully I'll be out here sooner rather than later.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports