Q. Great round. Assess your playing today and what was going well.

TONY FINAU: Yeah, thanks. I think right out of the gate I made a 60-foot birdie putt and I think it kind of got me under way. The golf course is quite a bit different than it's been years in the past, and so a little bit unfamiliar, I think, with how maybe it's going to bounce and how it's going to play, but with the 4-under round I thought that was a really nice start.

Q. What have you enjoyed about the renovation?

TONY FINAU: Yeah, I think it's been good. I think the renovation has been nice. Most of the holes I think are, you can tell they made it member friendly. I think you can roll the ball up more so than in the past. Once the golf course settles I think it's going to play really nicely. But overall I like the changes.

Q. A lot of young guys out here this week and you're a former young guy, did somebody give you --

TONY FINAU: (Laughing). Thanks. You can call me an old guy, veteran, whatever, it's fine.

Q. Seriously, did someone, when you were first coming out did someone give you a piece of advice you were to use for your benefit when you were first coming out here?

TONY FINAU: Yeah, you know, I did my best to be around play practice rounds with Vijay Singh, Steve Stricker, those guys. I wouldn't say they necessarily took me under their wing, but I kind of forced the issue in trying to get some practice rounds with them and just learn from them. So I think those are two great guys to learn from, and I definitely was able to just soak in my time with them and learn a little bit from them. Now I reached my 10th year, and I really can't believe it's been that long since I've been on TOUR, but, yeah, those are a couple guys I would say that I learned from.

Q. You are obviously, you know, early today, late tomorrow. Do you prefer that or would you like late/early or what do you like for tee times?

TONY FINAU: I always liked late/early, just because if you're playing well you got a short night, you're back at it seems like pretty fast. Whenever you're early/late it seems like maybe it's two different tournaments you're playing. Today was a great day, but it's now another 24 hours before I play tomorrow, so it's almost like a whole other tournament. You take 'em as they come. For the most part you would like to think you get enough of both throughout the season, and I feel like I've been getting a lot of early/late, but it's totally fine.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

144392-1-1044 2024-05-23 18:16:00 GMT

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