Target World Challenge: Donald, Clarke and Tiger talk

Just four days after celebrating his 28th birthday, England's Luke Donald shot a sizzling 64 in the final round to claw back from six shots down to win the Target World Challenge on Sunday, Dec. 11 at Sherwood Country Club in Thousand Oaks, Calif.

Donald picked up the winner's check of $1.3 million at the Tiger Woods' charity event, holding off Darren Clarke for the victory. Here's what Donald, Clarke and Woods had to say following the event.

Luke Donald

Q: Congratulations, Luke, 2005 Target World Challenge presented by Countrywide champion. Great finish, great day, and a good springboard going into 2006.

LUKE DONALD: Yeah, absolutely. Obviously I've had a couple of quite a few near misses this year, and it's always nice to finish the year off in that way, shooting 64, and finishing off the job with a win is very, very satisfactory.

Obviously I tend to like the last tournaments of the year. I think I won the Southern Farm Bureau was the last tournament, and when I won the World Cup with Paul Casey that was my last tournament, so I have a good record with my last event.

Q. Eight shots back is not an advantageous position, but did you feel confident coming into today?

LUKE DONALD: I think I was six shots. I felt like it was the last round of the tournament, the last round of my year. I gave it my all, and who knows, if I shoot 8 under, I might have a chance.

Obviously I expected Darren, Padraig and Michael to maybe one of them out of those three maybe score 3 or 4 under, so I thought if I shoot 8 under it might be good enough.

Q. On Thursday after five holes you were 1 or 2 over and probably still feeling a bit jet lagged. Can you chart your progress from that position and what you were thinking to where you are now?

LUKE DONALD: Yeah, I mean, Thursday I really didn't feel very good health wise. I was struggling a little bit with some kind of sinus, kind of a head cold, and was struggling and had a few birdies, few bogeys early on, cracked the face of my driver on the 5th hole and just played out with a 3 wood after that.

You know, I think after seven holes I was 2 over par for the tournament, and I bogeyed 10. So I was 3 over through 10, feeling down on myself, and then I made a few birdies and luckily finished birdie birdie that first round, got me back to even par. You always feel a lot better about yourself if you're at even par rather than 1 or 2 over.

I just kind of built my tournament after that round.

Q. Does that help set you up for '06? The Masters you played well last year, it's a Ryder Cup next year, or is there too much space in between now and '06?

LUKE DONALD: I think any time you win it gives you a lot of confidence. I think it's just a nice feeling to know that I came here and beat a very, very strong field; 16 of the top 20 players in the world were here. There are a few guys outside the top 20, but it was a very, very strong field, and that's a lot of satisfaction, to know that you can come here, play one bad round, even the first round, and still win.

That's going to give me a lot of confidence going into next year.

Darren Clarke

Q: I know it was kind of a disappointing day, but all in all, it was a good week.

DARREN CLARKE: Yeah, all in all it was pretty good. Today was obviously disappointing. I swung it pretty poorly all day and it was going left a bit, and then bogeying two holes of the last three was not really the way I wanted to finish. I should have went out last night.

Q. Kind of unlucky on the last par 5?

DARREN CLARKE: Well, you know, as I said, I was fighting it left all day. Not big left, but just enough to get myself in difficult, tricky positions to get up and down, and just sort of caught a big hill on 16, and then the last well, I can't believe I missed it that far. Hit it all over the place, lack of alcohol.

Q. Luke has been a good player for a while. Is this going to help him for '06 do you think?

DARREN CLARKE: Obviously he played fantastic today to shoot 64 and get the win, which is great for him. I think he'll get stronger and stronger.

Q. Any regrets from Thursday night on?

DARREN CLARKE: Only last night (smiling).

Q. What did you do last night?

DARREN CLARKE: Nothing (laughter).

Q. And your golf, as well, you finished very strongly, as well?

DARREN CLARKE: Yeah, I put myself in position to win again. I went first, second, second the last three tournaments. I'm disappointed to finish the way I did today; two bogeys out of three was not very good. The one on 18 didn't make any difference, but the bogey on 16 was a little bit of a disappointment. I hung in there and played not bad.

Tiger Woods

Q. It was a great week weather wise. Nothing could have been better except your golf game. Talk about what kind of a week it was for you and for your foundation.

TIGER WOODS: Oh, absolutely incredible, for the weather to be this good and to have these people come out. We have a lot of people here; it's very exciting. Again, it's what we're trying to do for kids, and I think overall this was an absolutely awesome week.

Q. Talk about how you played.

TIGER WOODS: Not very good at all. It's been a long week, a long year, and it's taken its toll. I just couldn't put it all together.

Q. Are you looking forward to your birthday?

TIGER WOODS: I'm just looking forward to putting the clubs away for a while. I probably won't remember my birthday.

Q. Are you glad this season is over?

TIGER WOODS: I am, I am. The stress that I had starting at the TOUR Championship, this has been a long stretch. I've been playing a lot of golf, putting on a lot of miles. My battery is just running a little low.

Q. Talk a little bit about your foundation.

TIGER WOODS: My foundation? We're trying to help kids. We've got 3 million kids involved in the program in the country. We've got a learning facility going up here in Anaheim, so a lot of positive things.

Q. Anything you'll be working on during your downtime?

TIGER WOODS: Yeah, I'm just putting the sticks away, not going to touch them for a while. I'm looking forward to getting my body back to being healthy.

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