Vijay Singh shoots a course-tying 66 in the second round of the 80th PGA Championship.

Vijay, some thoughts on your round today, please?

A. It was a very solid one. I think the key was the start of my round. I made -- birdied the first two holes and then birdied the 4th hole and -- what other holes did I birdie? Yeah, I think I birdied the 7th hole and the 9th. So the front nine was -- I played very solid round and kept my round going from there on. That gave me confidence. And I'm hitting the ball really good too. I've been hitting the ball good for the last two or three weeks and kept going with it.

JULIUS MASON: Thank you. Questions, folks?

Q. Vijay, can you talk about the difference between yesterday's round and today's round? Were things just going your way or were you playing better?

A. I hit a lot more greens today than I did yesterday and obviously I putted a lot better. Putting is -- you've got to putt well on greens like this. It's getting hard and fast. And if you -- if you're on the correct side of the pins, you have a good chance of making birdies and that's what I did today. I hit a lot of fairways and I played a solid round.

Q. Vijay, what is your approach and mind-set for the weekend now? You're right in contention or in the lead.

A. I just like to go do what I did today tomorrow and the day after. If I can hit a lot of greens -- I think the key is to hit a lot of fairways over here. If you can keep the ball in play, you have a chance to hit the greens over here. If you miss the fairways, although you can advance the ball, there's a lot of trees in front of the greens where you just cannot reach it. So hit a lot of fairways, hit a lot of greens and putt like I did today. I'm putting well. I have a good feel for the greens. That's a good thing to have going into the weekend.

Q. Vijay, can you tell me, do you feel the course is yours and the players out there for the taking now or is it still tough, it can jump up and bite any of these guys at any time?

A. In the morning the greens were a little bit softer and you can actually hold the balls on the green. Right now two or three finishing few holes, it was getting really firm. And you need to play it to the fat part of the greens. If you go for the flags and you catch one on the wrong bumps out there, you really cannot get up-and-down. For instance, 17th hole you just miss it left, it's almost impossible to get close to the hole. So you've got to be careful out there. The wind's getting up a little bit. It's going to make scoring a little harder in the afternoon.

Q. Vijay, how many times have you used your driver in the first two rounds?

A. I used it once today, on the 15th hole, and twice yesterday, on the 6th and 15th. So it's not really necessary to hit a driver out there. Even if you hit the fairways with a 3-wood, you can reach most of the holes with a long iron, and I think it's better to be playing from the fairway over here than 50 yards closer to the hole than from the rough.

Q. Do you think that taking the driver out of your hands a little bit on a course like this, is that appropriate for a major championship or should guys have the chance to hit driver more?

A. Even hitting irons off the tees, it's not a gimme that you're going to put it on the fairways. You've got to hit really good shots to be on the fairway and to be on the correct side of the fairway. I hit a lot of 3-woods off the tees as well. Nothing's stopping you from hitting a driver. People can go out, like John Daly, hit driver every hole, I heard. You can go out there and hit driver if you want to. The problem is keeping it on the short stuff. So I think it's pretty fair.

Q. Vijay, can you talk about the birdie on 13?

A. Birdie on 13. You know, I hit a pretty good shot there. I had a good club. It was a club that I wasn't going to go past the pin with. And it was a really good hard 8-iron and came out perfect. Had a good read and had a good putt.

Q. Vijay, you're known as someone who spends a lot of time on the practice range. After a day like today where you've hit the ball really well, will you spend as much time out there working on your game?

A. You know, you go out there and just try to feel what you've been doing the whole week. And I'm just going to go out there, probably spend an hour on the range and putt a little bit, just to keep the feel going. I do practice a lot, but I've kind of cut down after a round now. If you know what you're doing and if you're hitting the ball well, you don't need to spend that much time on the range. So probably an hour after I'm done here.

Q. Vijay, a lot of players have mentioned that they found new confidence putting here. Is there anything about these greens that can get you on a roll and build that confidence?

A. The greens are rolling really nice. There's not too many times where you find the greens on the golf course almost the same as the greens on the putting green. The putting green greens over here are rolling the same and you get a good feel out of the greens on the putting greens. So once you get on the golf course, you got that feel going. It's probably the best major greens that I've ever putted on, especially the PGA. It's very true and if you get the right line, you have very good chance of making putts. There's not too much spike marks on the golf course. It helps us making good strokes and holing putts.

Q. You indicated the conditions get more difficult as the day progresses. The scoring will obviously be higher and your score will stand up pretty well. You'll be in contention going into the weekend. Is there a different mind-set you have going into contention on a major championship weekend versus a regular tournament?

A. You try not to have a different mind-set, but obviously the pressure is going to make you do that. I've played a lot of weekends going into the lead or close to the lead. But this is something different, I think. The pressure of a major is always different than normal tournament, and I'm just going to go out there and try to feel like a normal tournament as much as I can. I'm not saying that I'm going to feel that way. But if I can, it will be a good plus to me.

Plus I've got a good guy on the bag, which is going to help me. He's won two majors before with other guys, and he'll try to keep me level-headed if he can.

Q. Vijay, you spent the last two days playing with Stuart Appleby. Can you talk about the finish he had today with two birdies and how emotional was it for you playing in that group with him?

A. It was pretty emotional yesterday when he started off. He got applause in every green he approached. I'd never like to be in the situation like he is in. I take my hat off for him coming out so early and competing again. It was good to see him out here again and I tried to be as normal as possible and let him not think about what happened in the past. It was tough. I think it's tough for everybody trying to think about it.

Q. Two quick questions: First of all, who's your caddie this week?

A. Davis Renwick. He caddied for Elkington when he won the PGA in '95.

Q. You said two majors?

A. Yeah, Olazabal. When did Olazabal win The Masters? '94?

Yeah.

Q. There's been so much made of how much you do practice and you said you're just going to go out and practice for about an hour today. When you feel comfortable, do you ever not practice? Or is that something that you just can't get away from?

A. I like to practice, and there's always something you can practice on. If it's not the long game, it's the short game, or the putting. You can never practice enough putting. I just like to practice and I'm always working on something out there. You can't go out there and play a round of golf and hit -- and play 18 perfect holes. There's always something that you're going to do wrong and you kind of go out there and figure out what went wrong. And plus you need to wind down a little bit as well, which is good.

Q. Vijay, in what ways are you different as a player from five years ago when you nearly won this championship at Inverness?

A. Because I played here longer. I think that was the second year I played in America. And I just got used to the crowd, got used to the surrounding and the competition I've been playing with. I think my ball-striking has improved as well. I'm not so rugged off the tees. The whole game has improved. Plus my head is more level now than it has ever been. I think each year you play, you gain a lot more experience, a lot more know-how how to handle a situation like I'm in now.

Q. Vijay, did you draw any inspiration playing with Stuart for yesterday and today?

A. Sorry. Come again.

Q. Did you draw any inspiration playing with Stuart at all?

A. I tried not to think about what his situation was. And it's a major event, although I feel -- I feel for him a lot, what he's gone through in the past few weeks. I just try to go out there and do what I wanted to do. End of the day, this is a major and I need to focus on what I was doing. I think that's what I did and I did really good. And I tried to be as normal, like I said, with Stuart as possible and it seemed like he was coming out of it. He did a good job out there.

JULIUS MASON: Are you interested in his card? Birdies?

A. First hole I hit a 2-iron, 9-iron to about 4 feet. Holed that.

Hit a 3-wood, 3-iron on No. 2 about 40 foot away. It was on the green, and 2-putted. Second putt was about 2 feet.

Birdied the 4th hole. I hit a 2-iron, wedge to about 12 feet.

7th hole I hit a 2-iron to the rough. Hit an 8-iron to about 20 feet and holed that.

9th hole I hit a 5-iron to probably about 4 feet.

I bogeyed the 11th hole. I hit 3-wood and had to chip out.

It was in the rough and then hit a 9-iron in the bunker. It was plugged. So I had to blast out about 10 feet. Missed it.

Birdied 13. I hit an 8-iron to about 8 feet.

Bogeyed 17. I hit a 5-iron in the bunker. Blasted out about 12 feet and missed that one. That was it.

Q. Would you describe the shot at 11? What your -- or anytime when you're hitting that second shot to the 11th between those trees, how wide does that look to you?

A. You need to move the ball left-to-right over there. You can't -- well, you can hit a straight shot if you're straight down the middle of the fairway. It's -- it's a tough shot. You've got to keep it below the tree limbs. I think the key is to not try to hit the green on the fly. You need to bounce the ball maybe 10 yards short of the green and let it run up. If you try to fly there, then you're dealing with the trees and tree limbs. It's not that difficult of a shot if you're on the fairway.

Q. Vijay, two questions, actually. On the 18th hole after Stuart chipped in, how long was your putt and how did you read it?

It looked like you would have had the course record and, two, how does this compare to your 62 in the final round at Hartford?

A. Well, the putt was -- it wasn't a difficult putt. I read it right-to-left from behind the hole and left-to-right from the front of the hole. So I just went out and want to hit it straight. I lined it up pretty straight, and I thought it was going to move right, if anything, but it moved left pretty good. So it was almost a misread there.

It's a different situation. I think this is a better round compared to what I did in Hartford. Because Hartford, I was some ten shots off the lead, 12 shots off the lead. So this is a major event. Anytime you shoot under par in a major event it's a big deal. And I thought I -- this is a much better round I did today.

Q. Vijay, you had a sand shot on 14 out of the bunker onto the green. What did you hit out of there and can you describe what kind of shot it was?

A. It wasn't a bad lie. It was up against the lip, but I only had a 9-iron in my hand. And if you can get it out of the hole with any lip, that would be the 9-iron. So the lie was good and no lip.

It was a pretty easy shot. It tend not to be -- I mean, it looked pretty difficult when you're looking out from the ropes. When you're addressing the ball, it wasn't that difficult.

Q. Vijay, after winning the Buick Classic twice in Westchester -- I know you think that's one -- you like that course, one of your favorite courses. Do you see any similarities between the two courses that might help you this week?

A. They both have a lot of trees and a lot of rough. You need to hit the fairways, I think, on both golf courses. You know, small greens, very similar but different tournament altogether. In Westchester you've got a lot of long holes where you need to hit drivers and all that.

But here, it's every hole is a 2-iron or 3-wood and a different placement. This will be a much tougher golf course to score on because of the trees and small greens.

Q. Could you give us the spelling of your caddie's last name?

A. Renwick, R-e-n-w-i-c-k. He's a Scottish guy, too.

JULIUS MASON: Vijay Singh, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you very much.