August 20, 2014
An interview with:
STACY LEWIS
THE MODERATOR: All right, everyone. I'd like to welcome World No. 1, Stacy Lewis, to the media room. Stacy, just coming off the Wegmans LPGA Championship, you said a fan gave you some videos of your wins on Tuesday. What did you take away? I know you went and filmed your swing and look at it Friday night? What did you take away going into the weekend? You played great on the weekend.
STACY LEWIS: Yeah, I've been working on my golf swing now for really the last month or so. After the win in Arkansas, life got crazy and the golf swing just got a little bit off track, so I've been slowly working it back into where it needs to be. My coach has been kind of telling me the move that I need to do, and a fan just happened to give me these videos, so I figured, why not watch it? It's always good to see a few wins. So I picked out the final round at Texas, which was probably one of my best ballstriking rounds of the year, and just watched the swing. I could actually see the positions that my instructor was trying to get me into. I was comparing it to the videos I took on my phone from earlier in the week.
So I think just having that visual just kind of helped get the golf swing more in place. I'm still working on it. It's always a work in progress.
Q. Seven players with two wins or more this year. You have three leading the pack. How tough has it been at the top this year?
STACY LEWIS: It's been great. It's been a lot of fun. It's been really competitive. We've had a lot of close finishes, a lot of tournaments going right down to the wire. I feel pretty lucky to have the three wins. It's hard to win out here. It doesn't get any easier. So just happy to have the wins and been playing really consistent. So it was nice to kind of get, for me, I guess, get back on track last week.
Q. You're from the south, but you have some connections to Canada. You're up here pretty often. What's it like being back up here to play again?
STACY LEWIS: Well, it's great. We were just down the road a couple months ago with Manulife, and we love coming to Canada. The Canadian Open, specifically, we always get great golf courses to play on. This one is no different. So it's a tremendous golf course, fans. The weather I think is keeping some away today, but hopefully we get some good crowds this weekend.
Q. What's it going to take on this golf course? It looked pretty open off the tee out there. Do you prefer the Classic style courses like this?
STACY LEWIS: Yeah, I think obviously I haven't played here before, but I think scores will be good. It's a course you can make a bunch of birdies on, just because the greens are really big. You do have to hit it straight off the tee, so that will kind of be one thing that I'll look to do well this week is to drive the ball straight. But past that, you've just got to putt it well and hopefully make some putts at the end of the rounds.
Q. You kind of mentioned that up to drive the ball really well this week. Because of how undulating the greens are, how important is ball placement on the fairways and on the greens?
STACY LEWIS: The biggest thing, I think off the tee is a lot of the doglegs. If you get it on the right line, you can get it down a little further and have some shorter clubs into the greens. So the biggest thing is picking the right line and getting it there. Obviously, with the rain last night and what we're probably going to get the rest of the week, it's slowing the golf course down a lot. So it's a little bit more targeted golf, but you're also having longer clubs into holes, so it equals out.
Q. I know Lydia Ko kind of mentioned earlier and you did as well that the fairways are fairly wide open here. A lot of players have been saying that the rough is really thick especially around the greens. How important is scrambling going to be if you do miss a shot this week?
STACY LEWIS: The greens are so big that I think if you get too aggressive, yeah, you're going to be in trouble with the rough. But the rough, I think is more of an issue off the tee. You get a ball that is six inches into the rough and you could be just hacking it down the fairway. So I think the biggest thing for me is tee ball and then just making putts. The greens, you can hit probably 18 greens pretty easily on this golf course, so you've just got to hit the right shot and stay aggressive.
Q. This course took quite a beating over the winter. What were your impressions of the conditions of it now that it's been refurbished over the past couple months?
STACY LEWIS: I think the golf course is great. You can definitely tell in the greens areas there are some different grasses in there and areas where water sat on it. The fairways are probably some of the best fairways we've had to hit off all year, so I mean, you can't tell there. I mean, you really can't tell. If we were here a month ago, it might be different, but you can't tell at all all the stories that we've heard.
Q. Stacy, the last two people who were No. 1 in the world and I'm not counting your initial spot there, said they never imagined how difficult it was being the No. 1 player in the world. In fact, Yani Tseng after she dropped out of the number 1 spot is on record as saying she is relieved. Do you find that it has been that tough and the extra attention that you have to give to everybody, can it be preventing you from doing the things that you need to do to remain number 1?
STACY LEWIS: I mean, I think the hardest part about being number 1 is the balance. I mean, yeah, it's something that I've noticed. I've noticed a lot over the last three or four events is that everyone is now kind of realizing that I've been here. Now that I've been at No. 1 longer, that's who I am and there is extra attention. People are paying attention, there is more autographs, there is more stopping in between holes during practice rounds and during ProAms and it takes time. It's a lot of time.
I just think you have to kind of alter the way you practice and your routine, the way you do things. Maybe you come out earlier and practice before a lot of the people get here so you can get your work done. That's what I did this morning. I came out at 6:00 this morning and got some practice in just because I knew it would be quiet out here. You just have to alter things a little bit. I worked way too hard to be No. 1 in the world to say that I'm happy to give it up. I would never do that. I'm going to continue to work hard because this is right where I want to be.
Q. You are coming off the LPGA Championship Wegmans, and I know when Rory had his three wins in a row and he's going for his fourth this week, everyone was talking about how hard it is to continually win. How hard is it for you to rebound after a huge win like that? Do you find it mentally tougher coming into a tournament like this?
STACY LEWIS: Yeah, I think you look at what Rory did three weeks in a row like that, you don't see it a lot for that reason. I think mentally it's so hard to stay on that high. I mean, you're really on a high for a long time. The golf is probably the easiest part because once you're playing well, it feeds off of that. You see good shots, you see the ball going in the hole, and it continues.
Like for me, I came off of the win at Arkansas, and that was to me that was like winning a major. That was the ultimate. If I could have won a tournament this year, that would be one of them. I came off of that, and you kind of come off this high and then you actually relax a little bit. So it's a hard place to stay in but once you're there, your golf game, if your game is good, you can actually stay there for a while.
Q. So off the course I'm just wondering how the hospitality has been so far? The freebies and accommodations and that sort of thing as well what sort of makes the event special?
STACY LEWIS: Yeah, it's just a cool city. It's nice to actually be in a city where there are a lot of cool restaurants, a lot of things to do, and everything is relatively close too. I just got over Monday night so I haven't had a whole lot of time to do anything. But we'll definitely hopefully check it out as the week goes on.
Q. Any players parties you've been to or attended so far?
STACY LEWIS: I have not had time, no.
Q. Is being No. 1 what you expected when you were dreaming of it as a little girl?
STACY LEWIS: I don't think I ever dreamed of it as a kid. It's definitely not what I expected as far as the commitments and the times and things like that. I thought there would be some extra things, but I didn't think it would be quite to the extent that it is, but it's a great thing because our Tour is having more coverage where purses are going up, where social media is going crazy. Our numbers are just going crazy right now, and that's part of it. It's part of the deal, you've got to do it.
But other than that, the pressure, I put more pressure on myself, so that side of it is what I expected.
Q. You had three wins there in two months. Seeing Lydia and Inbee win on your heels, does that push you going forward?
STACY LEWIS: Yeah, it does. I think we're all three of us, and even you throw Suzann in there too, we're all pushing each other. We're all raising the bar. We've each gone on runs where we're playing better. I went on a run there early in the year and kind of forced Inbee. They kind of picked things up and started working and we're making each other better. That is the biggest thing. As long as we keep making each other better and keep having great finishes like we had last week, we're going to be around here for a long time.
Q. Is that pretty crazy to you to see Lydia could potentially threepeat here at 17?
STACY LEWIS: Yeah, I played with her when she won two years ago. It's just unbelievable at 17 that she has a chance to threepeat. I mean most 17yearolds haven't even been on Tour yet. It's really impressive. She's a great kid. It wouldn't surprise me if she did it again.
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