Q. Talk about the chip-in on 11, the degree of difficulty.
SHANE LOWRY: Yeah, it was a bad second shot. I got down there, and I was just trying to leave myself something inside 10 feet for par. Was rolling it nice all day, so made sure I got it there, and I did. I played it nicely. It was probably going maybe eight feet past or something like that, but that kind of -- it was a bit of a brucie bonus. To do well in tournaments on courses like this, you need breaks like that, and thankfully I got that. I kicked on a little bit from there and I struggled towards the end, but it's not easy out there. It's hard. Yeah, but I'm happy with my day's work.
Q. You started the final round last year kind of in a similar position. Is there anything you learned from that Sunday that you can maybe apply tomorrow?
SHANE LOWRY: I just hope it doesn't rain tomorrow.
No, look, this golf course, you don't know what's going to happen. You just need to stick in as long as you can. There's not many holes where you can stand up, and you don't want to be complacent but take it easy on them. Every hole is a bit of a disaster hole, or a lot of holes are a bit of disaster holes. You just need to be very cautious and aggressive to your targets and just go out there and give it your best, and if that's good enough at the end of the day, you hope to be standing here with the trophy.
Q. Obviously Chris has won out here, but a lot of guys on that board haven't. What's the role of experience for you tomorrow?
SHANE LOWRY: Just to hang around. If I can just hang around all day, hopefully I can give myself a chance coming down the stretch.
I think I did what I needed to do today. I knew I needed -- with the way the conditions were, I knew I probably needed to go out and shoot a decent score, I did, and I'm looking forward to tomorrow.
Q. What was the best part of your game today?
SHANE LOWRY: I putted nicely, hit the ball well. To be honest, first round I hit the ball unbelievable. Yesterday I putted quite nicely, and today I kind of put the two of them together. I missed a short one on 17, which I don't know where that come out of, but hopefully all that will come together tomorrow and I can shoot a decent score tomorrow.
Q. Can I ask you about the ribbon? I guess you got some pretty bad news?
SHANE LOWRY: Yeah, my uncle sadly passed away on Thursday morning. Yeah, my dad's brother, unexpected. It's very sad week for our family. To be honest, I wanted to go home on Thursday when I heard the news. A lot of people talked me out of it.
I'm here now. I'm trying to play for him and play for his wife and his kids and my cousins and my uncles and my aunts and everyone at home because we're a very close family and very proud of our name and very proud of where we come from. Green and white is just where he's from, that's Ferbane in Offaly, in Ireland, and said I'd wear it. Yeah, hopefully I can go out and make him proud tomorrow. Everyone keeps telling me how proud he was of me over the last number of years, and hopefully I can do him another day proud tomorrow.
Q. Can you tell us a little bit about him? Was he a younger brother of your dad?
SHANE LOWRY: He's two years older than my dad, so he's 66. He's just a great man. He loved working. He loved hard work. He loved hardship. He was big into Gaelic games at home. He didn't necessarily play at the highest level, but he was very involved and loved in the community, and he was just a great man. He was great craic, and I loved him.
It's a very sad day for our family. Yeah, it's just quite sad, and it's quite hard. It's been a difficult week. It's been very difficult not to be there at home for my dad because my dad is a big softy and he'll take this quite hard. But I'll see him in a couple of weeks when he comes out here, and yeah.
Q. What was his name, your uncle?
SHANE LOWRY: Jimmy Lowry.
Q. And your dad?
SHANE LOWRY: My dad's brother, yeah.
Q. Your dad's first name?
SHANE LOWRY: My dad is Brendan.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports