Q. Joining me here today after the first round of The ANNIKA driven by Gainbridge at Pelican is Grace Kim. Really strong round today. Could you take us through it?
GRACE KIM: Yeah, I knew that wind was going to be up a little bit, and knowing this course is generally on the tougher side, I just, yeah, kind of just played my own game; didn't focus too much on a specific score as such.
Yeah, made a few putts which was nice. Yeah, made -- I guess took my chances on the shorter holes with wedges in. Yeah, made some nice putts. Yeah, just carry that on forward.
Q. We've had lot of people talk about how quick the greens are out here. How do you mitigate that?
GRACE KIM: Yeah, obviously it's been quite firm and quick which is a nice combo. I really like that. I think just leading up to the event just quite focused on speed as well as green reading and trying to match that up as best I could, especially during my off week last week.
So I guess I managed to do that well today. Hopefully I can just continue on that, and, yeah, just kind of not forget that it is -- it might just get away from you.
Q. You have had an exciting year: Became a major champion and were a member of the winning International Crown team. Can you just kind of talk about how this year might've given you confidence or made you feel really secure in the way your game is?
GRACE KIM: Yeah, I guess at the start of the year I was quite low with my self-confidence, and I still have times where I don't think I'm good enough at times. I'm quick to be negative internally. So seeing that even if it wasn't my best stuff during the International Crown, I had my team to back me. Even if I was sick during Evian, I still had to get it done. Maybe I was not feeling my best, but I tried to give my 100% of all that I had.
And trying to learn around that and, yeah, I guess that just build on my self-confidence. You don't need your A-game and 100% to get it done. That definitely was a big learning curve and I'm very grateful for the year that I've had so far.
Q. Is this the second time you've played this tournament?
GRACE KIM: Yes.
Q. What did you learn about Pelican the first time through that maybe helped you today?
GRACE KIM: Yeah, I knew that wind was a nice factor, especially at this golf course. You're either going to have straight into or straight down.
And then obviously like I mentioned, the greens being quite quick. I heard last year was very windy for some of the fast greens we had, so just keeping that in mind and really focusing on getting my speed right on the putting green.
Yeah, just having some good numbers in, especially when to come to those gettable holes.
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