Ben Griffin hunts down the lead at the Charles Schwab Challenge.
Second round 63. How would you assess your round? It was pretty bad. Um didn’t really get No, I’m just kidding. It was great. Um got off to a good start. Um made a couple birdies. Um felt like this morning the course was a little bit softer. Um so I was able to attack a few of the pins. Um as opposed to yesterday afternoon kind of into the evening and felt like it was really warming up. So um yeah, it was a great round. Gave myself a lot of birdie looks. U made a good chunk of those and uh finished strong as well. kind of mentioned with course playing different from playing from last night to this morning course firming up. What was it like knowing birdie chances were out there? What was the last part of your question? Sorry. Just knowing those scorable chances were out there. Yeah. Um yeah, I mean it’s a golf course. It’s not that long um for us on tour, but it’s very much so a positional golf course. Um few dog legs. You got to try to keep it in the short grass to attack some of the pens. And so, uh, I felt like that was kind of the goal going into the round was making sure I I gave myself left myself in positions to to be able to attack and take advantage of the conditions. And so, um, hit my driver great, uh, most of the day. Had a couple little hiccup holes, uh, coming in, but then, uh, bounced back with birdies on eight and nine. And, yeah, the greens were rolling great, too. Um, it’s always nice playing a morning round where you have less spike marks, and the greens were rolling great. It’s shaping up as a pretty nice year for you. How do you feel like the results are sort of matching the way you’re playing? Yeah, I think they’re matching up pretty well. Um it was good to get a win a few weeks ago. Uh it was nice to top 10 the PGA championship uh last week and um yeah, I feel like it’s just a I put in a lot of work, especially in the gym um this year, training really hard, trying to gain some speed um stay healthy um and feel good out there and feel strong. And so, um, yeah, I feel like I’ve I’ve done a lot of I’ve done a lot of the right things this season to kind of get myself from where I was kind of the last couple years being a really good PJ tour player, but finishing, you know, in the 50s, not as well known of a name. And I feel like this year I’m trying to do everything I can to kind of help myself be more of an elite player out here and get in contention more. How much does it feel like it it is kind of a breakthrough year or is it too early for that or is it already kind of a breakthrough year because you won? You know, I feel like I’ve kind of made good steps the last couple years um just kind of building to get to that first win. And now that I’ve got that first win, I feel like it’s really freeing me up to come out and be uh not necessarily more aggressive, but just feel more aggressive. Feel like I I’m trying to win more. Not that I wasn’t trying to win in the past, but just kind of the monkey off the back where I’ve got nothing to lose mentality. Like we’re trying to attack pens and get up there um with the boys at the top of the leaderboard. So, um yeah, it’s definitely been a breakthrough year, but I think there’s more uh there’s more to come. And you mentioned the hiccups coming in. You had the par save after the bogey. Um how important is that when you’re trying to win a tournament to do something like that? That’s huge. Momentum is key in this game. Um there’s it’s a very cyclical game. you kind of get on birdie runs. At least for me personally, I feel like I get on a lot of runs in tournaments. Um sometime some weeks I never get on that run and other weeks I kind of get on a run or two and I felt like that was I got on a nice run leading up to that um those couple holes and the making that putt from the fringe on six was huge just to kind of keep myself um you know just just seeing a putt go in really from 10 to 12 feet to remind myself all right we’re still going we’re still keeping the pedal down and then birdieing uh oh sorry I think I said I birdied eight and nine I birdied seven and nine um coming in and so yeah it’s just uh staying aggressive, picking my targets, swinging hard, and um seeing where the the scores line up. Appreciate it. Yeah, of course. You mentioned momentum. What do you think will be key for you to maintain your strong performance throughout the weekend? Yeah, it’s uh it’s continuing to leave myself in positions to attack. Um that’s the key on this golf course. There’s so it’s it’s very much a treeine golf course. There’s a lot of trouble in spots. Even on the holes that don’t even seem that challenging, you can get yourself in a tough position quick. And so being confident to some of those uh targets on my T- shots important. Um and yeah, just trying to give myself a lot of birdie looks because um you know the scores are never crazy low here, but if you can give yourself a lot of looks for birdie and and knock down a few of them, you’re doing a good job here. Thanks Ben. Thank you guys. Appreciate it.
