What they said: Russ Cochran

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MODERATOR: Russ Cochran, 31, 33, 8 under 64 to start the ACE Group Classic. Your good play continues. You played well at Hualalai and then last week you were sort of right there at the end with a chance to win at Allianz.

Maybe talk about your start to the year and talk about today's round.

RUSS COCHRAN: You know what, the start of the year's been good for me. I was a little disappointed. I had the opportunity to play with kind of one of my heroes on Sunday there at Hualalai, with Tom Watson, and I just kind of stunk the place up a little bit. I felt bad I didn't play very well with him and I felt like I kind of held him back as well, so that was disappointing.

But I came back, and last week I had a chance toward the end to do something -- I tried to kind of hit a hero shot on the 18th hole off of kind of a tight lie and felt like if I could pull it off, that would be my only chance to win. But I was very happy with the effort last week. I felt like I was pretty on queue with my course management last week. I didn't putt particularly well, but I hit a lot of good shots and kept myself in contention so I kind of wrapped that week up.

Today I kind of turned the page, and after playing here very poorly last year and not putting well at all, this year, the course looked different, the weather obviously looked different. To be honest with you, I made everything I looked at. It was a surprise for me, but a welcome surprise.

MODERATOR: Russ, can you run through your birdies, any good saves? You had four in a row to close out the front 9.

RUSS COCHRAN: Yeah, got the ball up and down, hit a little chip up there about three feet and made it. Went over to 6 and hit a 7-iron into the par 3 there, maybe, I don't know, maybe eight feet, made that. Then on the 7th hole, I hit a driver and 3-wood just short and chipped it up about maybe eight feet there, made that. On number 8 I hit it about three feet. Number 9, I made about a -- I hit a sand wedge in there about, oh,

maybe 20 feet and made that, so that was a nice little run there.

Then came over on 11 and made a nice putt in there about maybe 12 feet for birdie after hitting a -- I think it was a 9-iron in there, hit a 9-iron in there about 12 feet.

13 was a good hole, it's always a good hole, par 3, and I hit a 6-iron in there to about 14 feet there, made that, so always a good birdie. Pulled my drive in the bunker on 14, tough driving hole, and pulled it in the bunker. Laid up with a 7-iron and hit a sand wedge to about maybe four feet there, made that.

Played kind of shaky on 16, 17 and 18. Hit a great drive on 16, or 3-wood, great 3-wood, but spun my wedge off the green, kind of a weak wedge, and putted it past actually about 10 or 12 feet, made that coming back for par. 17, drove it in the left bunker. I hit a 5-iron out of the left bunker, made a nice two-putt from about 60 feet. And then 18, I thought I hit a pretty good Drive, I guess it ran right and ran down the bank in the bunker, slipped on the bunker shot, hit it fat and got it up and down from 40 yards, so probably made a 15-footer there on the last hole.

So the putter was on, and like I said, the greens were -- if you're going to putt well, I think this is probably the week if they can continue to keep the greens the way they are.

MODERATOR: Russ, I was telling them, you have some connection to this area. Did you not practice down here before the season, right?

RUSS COCHRAN: I did. Last year I came down for six weeks and was out at Treviso Bay. You know, spent some time. I went to a couple other little clubs around and, you know, I love the place and feel comfortable getting around town and all that.

Just recently I ended up kind of for the family, kind of a family decision, we ended up at Tequesta, Florida, bought a place over there, but still have huge ties, friends and family here in the Naples area, cousins and stuff and a bunch of friends down here.

MODERATOR: Okay.

Q. Family connections here, where do they tie back from?

RUSS COCHRAN: It has to do on my mother's side, just her family, and they've been down here 25 years, so we come down here. I usually get a chance to say hello. I haven't even gotten a chance to talk to them this week because of the tournament, but my mom will be down probably in two weeks, or yeah, a couple weeks or whatever, a month, whatever, and she hangs her hat down here sometimes. Yeah, Naples.

Q. You had the injury issues at the end of your regular career, but even prior to that you never had kind of the great success that you would have even had last year. Just how do you explain coming out here and playing with confidence?

RUSS COCHRAN: Yeah. You know, that's funny because David Frost and I were talking about it. He didn't -- wasn't playing well toward the end of his PGA TOUR career and I didn't, either. I knew a lot of mine was really, really injury related, but I also knew that the game was changing, I think, and you know, you have to change along with it. I knew I had to get my ball up in the air a little bit more. I knew I had to drive it better. Just looking for a chance to get my wrist and arm better, and then all those things kind of fell into place and it's a funny game. When the confidence starts headed in your direction and you deliver a few times, you know, as far as hitting certain shots when you want to and stuff, then I think that you -- and I really want to hang onto that, too, so I'm trying to enjoy the whole process a little bit more and so far it's working out well.

Q. Are you more comfortable out here that you can recall you maybe had been in a long time on the PGA TOUR, and are you still getting used to that a little bit? You mentioned playing alongside Watson and feeling like you held him up a little?

RUSS COCHRAN: Yeah, I am. It's hard to relax. Actually, I really enjoy it. The way I look at it, the guys out here, even the great ones, they've fallen flat numerous times and that's just what golf is. But you try to keep putting yourself in that position and you try to see how you can do -- shoot at 52 years old. If I perform poorly, there's not really much anybody's going to say. I'll get mad at myself or feel uncomfortable or something, but shoot, it doesn't deter me. I'm trying to come right back the next week. So I think that stems just from the fact that I didn't know if I was going to get a chance to play a lot of competitive golf again, and now I'm back playing competitively and I really do like it.

Q. Who's believed in you most in your career, you or your kids?

RUSS COCHRAN: Or my kids? Oh, you know what, I think the honesty part really makes it easy for the both of us, or for both directions. For instance, I don't have any trouble telling them kind of the truth about things and I think they appreciate that. They don't always like to hear it. And I know they're very quick to point out the truth about some of my weaknesses or shortcomings, so I think that just helps.

I'm real happy with the relationship that we've kind of carved out in sports over the years, whether -- not just golf, and I think some of that comes from being on the road and having to ask tough questions and say tough things when you're not there, so you kind of probe a little bit more and you ask them how they're feeling and so forth. I think that makes a big difference.

Q. From the standpoint for you, have they been a key for you, though, as far as this progress goes recently?

RUSS COCHRAN: Yeah, definitely. I go back -- I had this conversation before, but it kind of started -- of course, you know, they're always pulling for you, you know that, but there's an honesty there. I mentioned before that when Reed came out, we were Monday qualifying and trying to carve our way out here. He said, Dad, from what I'm seeing -- you know, he didn't have the best golf eye in the world, he played baseball, but he said, From what I'm seeing, you can do this and all you need to do is settle in and play hard. He said, I'm telling you, it's going to happen. So when you hear that kind of confidence coming from him, you do, you think it's going to happen.

Q. Playing with Bernhard, what will that be like?

RUSS COCHRAN: You know what, I've played with him several times. I think probably the last time I played with him was in the Tour Championship last year. He's -- you know, look, when you play with these guys and they have Hall of Fame next to their name, you know they can do it and it's just a matter of you jumping in there and digging in and playing hard. But we're friends and he is, you know, not only a heck of a player but he's a heck of a person and I enjoy that part of it probably as much as it is golf. He's a great guy.

Q. Mark Calcavecchia was talking yesterday about how he doesn't put himself in the top echelon just yet as far as players out here. And the first guy he mentioned for being in that category was you. Are you comfortable with that? Are you mentally there?

RUSS COCHRAN: And it doesn't matter if you're comfortable or not. It's just about every single time you play, you need to get it done. But yeah, I think that's nice of him to say, but I don't think there's -- I think everyone's just waiting for him to get on track and start streaking and that's the way he plays, I think. We had a conversation about this golf course. I told him he would like this, and I thought he would like it. I think he played a good round today, didn't he?

Q. Yeah.

RUSS COCHRAN: Yeah, yeah. So, I mean, I fully expect him to play great. The thing about him, you know, I could use something he has. When he gets his foot on the pedal, everything headed in the right direction, it just doesn't come off. I would like to kind of learn that move myself, you know.

Q. The left-handed clubs, you learned to use a ladies set when you were first --

RUSS COCHRAN: Yeah, that's a while ago. I didn't know anything about golf, nobody really played too much in my family, and when you go in -- my mom got it for my birthday. When you go in and say what's the story, I need left-handed clubs, my son's left-handed. If you come from a golf background, at that point they usually try to switch you over, so she just went in and ordered left-handed ladies clubs. The odd thing about that was, I started 3, 5, 7 and 9, and you start filling them in with men's clubs, so now 6, 8 and 4-iron, whatever, you fill in with your -- with the men's clubs and they end up being longer than the ladies. Your 8-iron's longer than your 7-iron. But that's a part of it. We tried -- we did a lot of stuff, a lot of sports and I was glad they had the insight to know I liked it and it was a good fit for me personally, so it's pretty cool.

Q. When did you get the clubs squared away with normal men's, same length and everything?

RUSS COCHRAN: About three years, probably from 9 to 12.

Q. That's a recurring theme throughout lots of left-handers' careers in sports, right?

RUSS COCHRAN: Yeah, I never understood the left-handed/right-handed thing. My dad just kind of told me, he said, Look, if you've got that hand-eye and you've got that action, and what, you think the ball knows whether you're left handed or right handed? We didn't -- it wasn't even an issue. And especially if you start shooting decent scores and beating some of the other kids around, they say, Oh, no, leave him alone. So that's the way that worked.

MODERATOR: Russ, continued good luck. Thank you.