Certainly, if you can't manage your game, you can't play tournament golf. You continually have to ask yourself what club to play, where to aim it, whether to accept a safe par or to try to go for a birdie. You can't play every hole the same way. I never could.

All other things being equal, greens break to the west.

You hear stories about me beating my brains out practising, but the truth is, I was enjoying myself. I couldn't wait to get up in the morning, so I could hit balls. When I'm hitting the ball where I want, hard and crisply, it's a joy that very few people experience.

There's no set time or schedule for developing one's skills as a professional golfer, and it certainly doesn't come overnight. It's a muscle-memory exercise that comes over time.

The truth is, the first golf club I owned was an old left-handed, wooden-shafted, rib-faced mashie that a fellow gave me, and that's the club I was weaned on. During the mornings we caddies would bang the ball up and down the practice field until the members arrived and it was time to go to work. So I did all that formative practice left-handed. But I'm a natural right-hander.

If the Masters offered no money at all, I would be here trying just as hard.

I see no reason that a golf course cannot be played in 18 birdies. Just because no one has ever done that doesn't mean it can't be done.