Media Center Interviews
March 28, 2023
Pre-Tournament Interview with Beau Hossler
DOUG MILNE: We will go ahead and get started, like to welcome Beau Hossler to the interview room here at the Valero Texas Open.
Beau, thanks for joining us. I think you're making your fifth or sixth start here and you're coming off a top-5 finish last year on the strength of that second round 6-under 66. Not an easy course to put up a number like that.
Just some thoughts on being back here. You were just on the phone with PGA TOUR Radio where you said it's nice to come back to a place where you've enjoyed success. With that said, just a few comments on being back here.
BEAU HOSSLER: Yeah, it's great just living up the road in Austin, it's an easy drive down, pretty easy week. Larson puts everything together pretty nicely for us, staying on site.
The golf course is great. It seems like they've done a nice job of making the necessary adjustments on this course over time. I know it was pretty diabolical when the Tour first came here and they've kind of cleared out some of the native area if you call it and re-did the bunkers a couple years ago. I'm a big fan of the course, I'm a big fan of the area. It's nice to have had some success as well last year. I think I had a good opportunity to win and hopefully I can do that again.
DOUG MILNE: You're in the midst of a good year, five or six top-25 finishes, I know you're coming off a few missed cuts, but what are you feeling good about? I heard you just say that your driver, you're feeling good off the tee right now.
BEAU HOSSLER: Yeah, off the tee's been nice and the short game's been good. I've just got to put it together with the irons and the putter a little bit and I'll be in good shape. All in all, starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel a little.
Q. You didn't play a practice round today, did you?
BEAU HOSSLER: No, today was not worthy of a practice round.
Q. You're not going out in that wind?
BEAU HOSSLER: No.
Q. A lot of people know that Texas is known for its wind and you're a Texas guy, having gone to UT. What are some of the advantages that you and other Texas guys might know about this wind that you can say that you like to use when you're out on the course?
BEAU HOSSLER: Honestly, I'd say the whole thing is just experience, having a decent idea of how much it's going to affect the ball flight. Also, maybe just having again more experience playing kind of the necessary shots in that condition, bringing the ball flight down a little bit. It's not something that you necessarily do unless you have to, but a lot of days in the spring in Texas you have to, so I've kind of learned how to do that over the last few years.
Q. What about around the greens and putting?
BEAU HOSSLER: Well, I think the thing that a lot of people don't understand is how much the wind affects putts. It's obviously very difficult to stay stable in your stance, that's part of it, but also if you were to take a robot and watch them hit putts and start moving the wind around, you would be shocked at how much that affects which direction and the speed of the putts.
So yeah, again, it's not like I have any -- anything dialed into the tee, but just having a little bit more experience maybe than some guys out here. With that being said, it's been kind of a windy year for us feels like all year, doesn't it? We've played in some pretty adverse weather. To my forecast I hadn't seen too much wind forecast for the actual tournament days, but like I said, today blowing as hard as it is, it's not really -- you're not going to get really anything done in the practice round that is of worth to me.
Q. You were tied for the lead going into the final round last year. What did you learn about yourself in that final round that you were able to apply going forward?
BEAU HOSSLER: I don't know that I learned anything about myself. I think just learning from having experience is a huge deal, right? I think the main thing you learn from that is taking that -- those emotions and those feelings that you get in that moment and just accepting them and knowing what it feels like for the next time.
I've had a lot of experience in my career with opportunities to win golf tournaments from the time I was 9 or 10 years old until now, so certainly they are fewer and far between on the PGA TOUR with how elite our competition is and how difficult it is to win out here, but with that being said, the more reps you can get, the more comfortable you get. Just like anything else, the first time you do something at a new level it's a little bit eye opening and then the next time you're more comfortable and the next you're even more.
I think I performed quite well. I had a little mishap there on the par 5 I remember on the back nine, but other than that I didn't really hand it back. J.J. played some incredible golf to win that golf tournament. At the end of the day, all you can do is give yourself an opportunity on the back nine and try and hit the best shots you can.
Q. What have the emotions been like lately with the run of form of missed cuts that you've had?
BEAU HOSSLER: Yeah, frustration obviously, but I try and understand that the peaks and valleys of the career are, they're for everybody, right? You just hope to keep the peaks a little higher and the valleys a little higher as well. At the end of the day, it is what it is. Hopefully I can at least learn something from those and, like I said, have a week off to go and work on the stuff that I needed to to hopefully start to turn that form around.
Q. Are you a basketball guy?
BEAU HOSSLER: I'm not really a basketball guy, although I did watch the Texas game here a couple days ago. It was a little disappointing, but certainly promising to see the program moving in the right direction.
Q. I was going to ask you what you thought about them hiring Rodney Terry full time?
BEAU HOSSLER: To be fair, I don't follow basketball enough to make an educated comment on that.
Q. You mentioned it before but I wanted to ask you about staying on site here and how unique that is. How many times do you typically get to do that throughout the year?
BEAU HOSSLER: This may be a better question for you. Not very many.
DOUG MILNE: I was going to say Mayakoba, formerly Mayakoba.
BEAU HOSSLER: Yeah, I would say less than five.
DOUG MILNE: Honda. Did you play Honda?
BEAU HOSSLER: Yeah.
Q. And what does that do for you either maybe on the course or maybe not on the course, even from a mental standpoint, how nice is it to be able to get off the course and be where you want to be?
BEAU HOSSLER: Yeah, it is nice, the resort here is incredible. Just makes things a little easier. I think playing the PGA TOUR is at times, with the logistics of everything, things that should be easy are not and this just makes it one step easier for us this week. I think everybody's really happy to be here and to just walk down the street literally to the clubhouse and not have to sit in traffic or get yelled at by parking people or anything like that is always a nice thing.
