THE MODERATOR: Stewart, a real nice start for you today. How would you summarize your opening round?
STEWART CINK: Actually, I thought it was kind of sloppy to be honest. I was pretty neat early on, and then when the conditions lightened up and got better, I got worse.
It was not the cleanest day. I didn't finish like I wanted to. I just felt like I threw away shots the last hour of the round or so.
But all in all, it's a tough golf course. It really is tough. We didn't really know what to expect. We didn't know what the scoring was going to feel like. It's just a tough course. There's a lot of challenges out there.
Q. On 12 can you take us through that eagle and what you hit and what the strategy was there?
STEWART CINK: Okay, yeah. That was just a perfect yardage, the kind of yardage you dream of when you play professional golf. It was just a full driving range pitching wedge, perfect, 146 yards, and there was no reason not to go straight at the flag. It was just sitting there like a perfect target. As soon as it left the club, I was like, this can't be outside five feet, and it landed, bounced a yard past the hole and spun back in. It was a perfect setup. But you still have to execute those. It's amazing how many times you have those perfect setups and you hit a poor shot. I executed a really good shot there, and it went in the hole.
Q. What are your memories from being at the U.S. Open, and obviously the course is a lot different since the redesign. What are your impressions of it then and now?
STEWART CINK: Well, this is the third Congressional I've seen because in '97 the U.S. Open was a completely different golf course than we played during all those tournaments that Tiger Woods Foundation hosted. It was not the same. Then now this course is not the same as that.
A third rendition, great piece of property. I was actually really interested to see what happened here because Andrew Green did this course and then a couple years later he came and did our course in Atlanta, East Lake. I play at East Lake and I love it, and I was very curious to see this.
I think this is really good, too. It's fun to play. There's a lot of challenges out there. But it gives you room. Golf is not supposed to be real easy if you don't keep it sort of on the straight and narrow, and this course has got a lot of challenges, but there's a lot of clever design work out there, and I'm sure the PGA is going to be quite conscious of the slopes and everything with the hole locations. I don't think they're intending to kind of embarrass anybody, because you could out here.
They set it up great today. It was really good. There was a lot of holes that were very accessible, some very challenging hole locations, too, and a great mix.
Q. Obviously '97 was a rugged test. I think three guys were under par the whole way. How would you compare the degree of difficulty now?
STEWART CINK: It's just a different kind of difficulty. In '97 it was rough, like, six inch deep rough and you couldn't hit it 50 yards out of the rough. The golf course was pretty straightforward as far as design, back to front greens, poa annua, a lot of break on putts. Now it's just a lot of different contours on the greens, a lot of interior contours where you've got hole locations that are protected by slopes, by side hills, by mounds, by dropoffs, and deep bunkers. The rough is also difficult to play from, but it's not six inches deep. It's just a completely different type of challenge from '97. But still, shooting a low score is not easy out here.
Q. What do you take from today that you can kind of apply for the next few rounds?
STEWART CINK: Well, I've just got to clean up my technique a little bit. I was just a little sloppy today. I just didn't execute all that well. I did hit some nice shots, but a lot of the shots were good results that really weren't great shots. I hit one really great shot, and it went in the hole. Other than that, I hit some good shots that worked out pretty well. But our game plan, me and my caddie Chris Jones, our game plan is really good. We're going to be sticking to that. Like always, we're just going to keep on repping this thing until we get some good scores out of it.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports