By Robert Lusetich in Manassas, Virginia
21sep05
ADAM Scott caught the flu in Singapore and it won't go away, but it has been a small price to pay.
As he prepared to practise for the Presidents Cup with some of his International team-mates at the Robert Trent Jones Golf Club on Washington's outskirts yesterday, Scott, 25, was in buoyant mood. Seven-stroke wins - even in the Singapore Open - tend to encourage it.
The last time we saw Scott, at the USPGA in New Jersey, playing golf seemed to hold the appeal of root canal surgery.
"Yeah, it got to the point where it just wasn't fun for me any more," Scott said.
He left Australia at the start of the year and had simply burned out from living out of a suitcase, shuffling from tournament to tournament, for eight months.
"I just really needed a break," he said. "It's one of those things where I had to listen to my body but listen to my mind more importantly. My mind wasn't in the game.
"I put too much pressure on myself ... I was playing well [but] I just wasn't scoring well and it was so frustrating."
The antidote was, oddly, to go home to the Gold Coast and play golf. Not just golf: he surfed, played tennis and chilled out, too. But mainly, he spent his days on the links with mates.
"Yeah, it's bizarre that I ended up playing a lot of golf at home with my mates but all of a sudden it was relaxing. It was fun again," he said.
"Normally for me it's fun to play out here but those last couple of weeks, at the PGA and the NEC (World Series of Golf), it was a grind. Anyway, a few weeks back home and I went to Singapore and it was back to the old frame of mind and I really enjoyed it."
This week, during the sixth Presidents Cup which starts tomorrow (US time), Scott predicted he would need to draw on that experience often against the US team.
"You have to be so mentally tough for this event because there's a lot of pressure. You're not just playing for yourself out there, you don't want to let anyone down," he said.
Scott, who finished with a 3-2-0 record at the Presidents Cup in South Africa two years ago, will need to do a lot of heavy lifting with Ernie Els sidelined with a knee injury.
"Look, there's no question that Adam, and a lot of the other players, will need to do more because not having Ernie Els here hurts us a lot," International captain Gary Player said yesterday.
Scott said the external pressure couldn't be greater than that which he puts upon himself, but felt confident he would answer the challenge.
He also said that the Presidents Cup, still in its relative infancy, had already grown in stature, in part because of the thrilling 17-all tie in South Africa, which finished with Els and Tiger Woods trading long putts in near darkness on the third and final play-off hole.
"The event in South Africa was awesome, the whole week," Scott said. "And then the finish was unbelievable. It's one of my favourite memories. It was the most exciting play-off you'll ever see. It really pissed me off that it was a draw, but it was awesome anyway. If this can tap into that, I think this event will take off."
He also disputed the widespread belief that the US players did not care much for it. Scott cited David Toms, who collapsed on the course last week.
Toms was diagnosed with supraventricular tachycardia, an electrical problem in the upper chamber of his heart that can be treated with medication and fixed by surgery, but he put off an operation until after the Presidents Cup.
"Now it's an anticipated event for (US players). I think it got off to a start where it was a pain in the arse for them to play it, but I think it's got something about it now," Scott said.
The US has won three of the five Presidents Cup, losing once (in Melbourne seven years ago) and drawing.
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