Q. Can you walk me through that birdie stretch to close your round? As hard as it was playing did you know that you had something special going?
CARLOS ORTIZ: Yeah, I actually played a great first round, been playing good all day. I just got lucky, you want to call it, I got great numbers. Hit a great shot into 14, then a really good second shot into 15, and then I made a great putt on 16. Just one of these golf courses that if you hit it in the fairway then you have a chance to be aggressive. If not this rough is brutal. So I don't know, I'm happy the way I played.
Q. (No Microphone.)
CARLOS ORTIZ: It's high. It's tough. Thick. I guess it's a good practice for the U.S. Open, right? It's tough rough.
Q. (No Microphone.)
CARLOS ORTIZ: No, there's some places where it's just, it's narrow in some places and even around the greens you go barely off the green it's hard to judge if it's just going to barely come out or it's going to jump. So it's tough. But it's gettable. If you're hitting in the fairway it's gettable.
Q. How many holes did you play today?
CARLOS ORTIZ: 31.
Q. So how long a day does that make it?
CARLOS ORTIZ: It's a long day. I'm so tired. It's a long day. I'm used to playing from college 36 holes, but, I don't know, somehow it just, with this rough and being a tougher golf course, it just makes it even longer day than normal.
Q. What time did you wake up today?
CARLOS ORTIZ: 4:50. So it's been a long day. I'm ready to take a nap.
Q. Did you have to chip out? How many fairways did you miss that you felt like you couldn't advance the ball?
CARLOS ORTIZ: I actually didn't have that many. I had one today, I tried to chip it out, I didn't even get to the fairway. On 11, I missed the fairway right and tried to chip it out and I didn't even get to the fairway, so I had to chip out again. Other than that, most of the times I hit it either in the bunker or in the fairway where I could play from.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports