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I first saw Arnold Palmer when I was just a kid and he came to Columbus to play in a tournament. I watched him on the driving range hit balls that day. We went on to become great friends.
Naturally it is nice to be widely known for worthwhile achievements, but it forces you to do many things which you don't like to do and these things take up time you want for other things.
The long irons are the nemesis of the average golfer. I'm convinced that the underlying reason for this is that he keeps hearing how hard they are to handle. They're not that difficult, truly.
Well, I think that Augusta is not the same golf course that I grew up on. Bobby Jones' philosophy was giving you space off the tee; if you put it in the right side of the fairway, you ended up getting the right angle to the green.
Mostly I built golf courses the way I played golf, which was left-to-right. But I learned very rapidly that people wanted to see more than just the way I played golf and that I had to balance up what I was doing, right-to-left, left-to-right, etc.
I couldn't control Arnold Palmer, Gary Player, Tom Watson or Lee Trevino. The only person I could control was me. The only person I could prepare for events was me. And if I didn't play well, I didn't play well, and I wasn't going to compete.
When I fly in a helicopter, I insist there be two sets of controls, one for me in case something happens to the pilot. I'm no expert, but I know enough to at least get the thing on the ground. Nothing scares me like the thought of not being in control.
Sometimes the biggest problem is in your head. You've got to believe you can play a shot instead of wondering where your next bad shot is coming from.
There isn't a flaw in his golf or his makeup. He will win more majors than Arnold Palmer and me combined. Somebody is going to dust my records. It might as well be Tiger, because he's such a great kid.
A Nicklaus Design golf course is done by the guys in my company that I work with, that have been trained in my vision, and they do what they think I might do. They might come in the office and ask me questions and I'd certainly answer their questions, but I'm not involved in the site visits or anything else.
I've wanted to design golf courses ever since I was a kid. I suppose it comes from the way I've played the game. To find the proper way to play any hole, I've always begun by asking myself what the architect has tried to do with it.
Sometimes, I'm an ogre. I can be short. I'll walk into the office some days and I've gotten up on the wrong side of the bed, and everybody knows it. I'm a perfectionist. I like to be organized, and I like to get everything done today.
Did you know there's probably more golf played in Iceland than most places in the world? They play 24 hours a day in the summertime and the northern part is warmer than the southern part.
How people keep correcting us when we are young! There is always some bad habit or other they tell us we ought to get over. Yet most bad habits are tools to help us through life.
I like to catch fish and release them. I probably haven't killed a fish that I've caught in sport fishing for 20 years. No reason to kill it. You know, just take it and release it.