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When you're hitting a fairway wood, you've got a lot of real estate to cover to get to your target. Your first instinct is probably to give it a little more power because you're worried about coming up short.
Being away for the weekends, and me being the international player that I have been for those 30 years, I've spent a lot more time flying around the world, playing different golf tournaments around the world.
I don't think people can watch University of Texas basketball or football games with me - really, anything Texas is playing - without wanting to punch me in the face. I'm as big a Longhorn fan as you'll find.
I have an orthopedic pillow that's made out of a sponge material. I have a plate in my throat, and I have to be careful or I could end up with a bad neck in the morning. That pillow is a must everywhere I go.
I never think of yesterday. Can't do anything about it. I'm a positive guy. When you really deep down look at it, we go to bed every night, get up every morning, stay here for 70 or 80 years, and then we die.
I was always a guy who wanted to be associated with a brand that meant something to me, something I was proud to be associated with... I always wanted sponsors that felt good to be associated with me as well.
Doubt yourself and you doubt everything you see. Judge yourself and you see judges everywhere. But if you listen to the sound of your own voice, you can rise above doubt and judgment. And you can see forever.
The beautiful thing about the game of golf is you can play good golf and compete well into your later years, and you can't do this in basketball or football or baseball. But in golf, it's a longer live sport.
The hardest thing I ever did was get sober. I was drinking two and a half bottles of whiskey a day and taking 40 Vicodin. If I had known I was going to live this long, I would have taken better care of myself.
Before you take your address, while you're still reading the putt, imagine the ball tracking on the line you've chosen and falling into the cup. If you don't believe you can make every putt, why bother trying?
I was a basket case, you know? When I got mad, I threw clubs, you know? And if things weren't going well, I would walk off a course. I think I lost a little bit of respect, but hopefully I've gained that back.
A competitor will find a way to win. Competitors take bad breaks and use them to drive themselves just that much harder. Quitters take bad breaks and use them as reasons to give up. It's all a matter of pride.
My golf swing is a bit like ironing a shirt. You get one side smoothed out, turn it over and there is a big wrinkle on the other side. Then you iron that one out, turn it over and there is yet another wrinkle.
To win at Augusta and to win The Open Championship at St. Andrews, it's hard to put it into words as a golfer, as an athlete, as a guy - I'm not rich in history, I can tell you that. I'm not a great historian.
You could argue that if the average golfer plays a golf course with 430-yard par 4s and they always miss the green, that's good practice. It's definitely great practice to play a course that's too long for you.
I've never set up any golf course that would favor anybody. I try to make it exactly the opposite, which is what we did at Valhalla when we modernized it to accommodate the lengths players are hitting it today.
If I go gambling the slots, some of my friends will come with me and play along with me. It's not like I'm starting out with $500 a pull or $1,000 a pull. I go in there and play $25, and if I win, I play $100s.
If you add up all the federal and you look at the disability and the unemployment and the Social Security and the state, my tax rate's 62, 63 percent. So I've got to make some decisions on what I'm going to do.
I've been in some seriously bad places playing golf and it's just part of the game. You're going to hit bad shots, you're going to be in bad spots, and each course, when you learn it, you learn where not to go.
When I'm a little fatigued, sometimes I baby it. I don't try to do it. I'm not 100 percent. I probably won't be the rest of conference play. I just have to play through it. I've never really been injured before.
I understand golf is a game, and I've never treated it as anything else. Family is something that's very special, and so they all contributed to the room. They all contributed to what my life was, my career was.
At a certain point in the [golf] tournament, it becomes a match play event and becomes a match play event against who is on the leaderboard, so you have to know who is there to do what you're going to try to do.
I was a pitcher, and my dad played in college. The hardest day of my life was telling him I was going to quit to focus more on golf. But with golf, I felt like the game can't be perfected, and that motivated me.
I've heard people say my swing's not perfect, and I know that. But golf's a natural sport, very sensitive. It's played a lot by feel. I don't care if my swing is too flat. If it works, I don't have to change it.
My body is a little bit sore from all of the practicing and playing and training, and your mind gets a little tired of it, too. It's nice to be able to recharge and come back fresh for the remainder of the year.
You have to look at the past in order to learn from it and move on. I've done a lot of reflecting over the past year. And certainly, I've turned the corner and am looking more toward the future in a lot of ways.
One of the things my dad kept instilling in me was the joy of the game. He made it fun for me. A lot of the time I see kids that don't enjoy being out there and that's a shame; you're supposed to enjoy the game.
I enjoy every second I'm in the gym. I love to challenge myself, push myself; obviously there's a lot of different routines and a lot of different stuff we do - love cycling, and again, it's part of my lifestyle.
The first win came very quick, and I didnt know what it meant to win a major championship. I was a teenager, I was very young. I didnt know what I was doing. I just needed some time to get settled in on the tour.
Do I want to tackle a 230-pound guy who's running like a deer? Heavens no, no one in their right mind would. But there is something that drives me and compels me to stick my head in there and give it my best shot.
I was shooting in the low 70s and 60s by the time I was 12. That's the great thing about golf. It doesn't matter how old or young you are. If you're 90 and can shoot a good score, people will want to play with you.
The first win came very quick, and I didn't know what it meant to win a major championship. I was a teenager, I was very young. I didn't know what I was doing. I just needed some time to get settled in on the tour.
The successful people seem to have blinders on. Everything is straight ahead. They go forward and know exactly what they're going to do once they've made up their mind to do it, and by God they don't look sideways.
When you lip out several putts in a row, you should never think that means that you're putting well. When you're putting well, the only question is what part of the hole it's going to fall in, not if it's going in.
I learned through the 'Jack Nicklaus Lesson Tee,' the cartoon. Back then, it was 1970 or '69 when it came out. Learned the grip that way and everything in the cartoon... So that's kind of how it all started for me.
But I'll tell you something: We had a big family discussion about it recently, my two sisters and I, and I pointed out that we all have the same genes as our mother and we're all susceptible to becoming alcoholics.
The great thing about my two lives is I love them both. I'm very ambitious and nothing gets in the way of me practising and concentrating on winning golf tournaments. But then I come home and get back to normality.
My mom and dad worked very hard to give me the best chance in - not just in golf but in life. You know, I was an only child, you know, my dad worked three jobs at one stage. My mom worked night shifts in a factory.
There's nothing wrong with having your goals really high and trying to achieve them. That's the fun part. You may come up short. I've come up short on a lot on my goals, but it's always fun to try and achieve them.
I was living a life of a lie. And I was doing a lot of things, that hurt a lot of people. And stripping away denial and rationalization you start coming to the truth of who you really are and that can be very ugly.
I almost didn't turn pro at all. I was tempted to be a career amateur. I worked as an investment banker for nine months after I got out of school, and the money was fantastic and promised to get even more lucrative.
The only way to win tournaments is with the short game. Over half your shots out here are within 30 or 40 yards. Ballstriking is where I'm trying to improve, yes, but more to eliminate big numbers than make birdies.
I have a special feeling for Blue Hills CC, where I won perhaps the most important tournament of my life when I was 14 - the Kansas City Match Play Championship. It gave me a dream of becoming a professional golfer.
At that time, I feel sad, and I feel no one knows how hard I work and how many tears. They only know the score. At that time, I feel very lonely because no one understands since they haven't been world No. 1 before.
I cleaned up everything behind the scenes and simplified my life. I made some changes in my staff. I changed management, my accountants, my bookkeeping team. I had a full refresh. For me that was extremely important.
I think people relate to me because of the ups and downs I have had. I mean, I've shared a lot of strong emotions in my life, that I think maybe 'cause they believe I'm not scared to tell everybody I'm a human being.
I was not great behind the counter. I had a week off without asking for it. Another time, we had a cart go up in flames, and we went out on another cart, which we wrecked by running it into the cart that was on fire.
I started playing golf because I wanted to be good. After a while, you have to come to a decision of, 'Am I good enough or not?' If you say 'yes,' then it's a simple step towards deciding to be as good as you can be.
This is happening all over the world. It's not just this golf course. Hopefully, if it stays dry, it will let a few more people in (contention). If it gets wet, though, there's only a few people where it's attainable.
I am naturally extremely proud to be selected as European Ryder Cup captain for 2016, european Ryder Cup has been a massive part of my life and my career so to have the chance to lead Europe next year is a huge honor.