2025 Truist Championship. First Day. Keith Mitchell.
What were your impressions of the course? It’s a great golf course. Love playing it. Um definitely old school and um you know we don’t we don’t play a ton of these so it’s it’s nice to have that as a get a little refresher out here. Kevin a lot of uh greens that have one really uniform slope outside of a little small nuances. In the practice rounds, my Kai and I were just drawing an arrow pretty much to determine what direction the entire green sloped and you always kind of play to that side so you can stay below the hole because if you get if you get above the hole or really pin high in the wrong side, I mean you have a really fast putt, have a ton of break. So trying to stay below the hole out here is huge. I mean given so much how the game has changed so much, you know, the technology you guys, you know, was built for a completely different era of players. Is it kind of cool to come to a place like this kind of have those two worlds meet? For sure. It’s I mean again this golf course is is just classic as it gets traditional and you know the weather was just absolutely perfect today. So it didn’t really have much um much going to make it play harder. Um so being able to take advantage of it today which with the weather was uh was exactly what we were trying to do. How do you think it played to your strengths? There’s a couple bunkers that you need to be able to carry on a few holes and just not having much wind, I hit a lot of drivers and I can I can see some holes that are downwind lay back a little bit and some holes that are in the wind, the bunkers could really come into play. So today I was able to either avoid them or hit over them and that’s not going to be the case with rain or wind. How do you prepare as a leader when you when conditions are going to change so dramatically? you you just do the same things and just change your game plan relative to, you know, the holes, where the pins are going to be, what the wind’s going to do, and how the rain’s going to affect how you’re going to play it. But all in all, it’s just the same stuff. When did you find out you’re going to be uh good question, give or take a week, have you What did you know about the course coming in? I have a buddy that’s a member that kind of gave me a little bit of of info, but honestly, nothing. Um, I knew it was a great golf course. Everybody that I talked to said it was amazing and they were right. It’s we’re we’re lucky to be here and I just, you know, plotted my way around on Monday and Wednesday to figure out what to hit and and, you know, where to kind of try to put the ball on the green. What’s your favorite hole after? Oh, great question. Uh, probably what we play as the 14th, the little par three. Why do you like it? I think good short par thres are I wouldn’t say a lost um lost in modern golf architecture but they’re rarer and um much more rare and that one is is just the perfect example. The pin today was only three off the left so guys were hitting it really close but if you missed it three paces left there’s no way you’re getting up and down. Keith, you’ve been leading after the first round in multiple tournaments this year and then it’s kind of gotten away from you. What’s it going to take to kind of switch it up and maybe get over that hump and get a win this year? Three more rounds like today, we’ll we’ll probably do it. Um, and trying not to win on Friday and Saturday and Sunday. Just trying to play my best and you know, it’s harder than uh then I’ve made it pretty hard lately. So hopefully I can just, you know, stay in front of it. Good. I think.
