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I quit flying myself last year and that was difficult for me because I enjoy it as much as playing golf. It was an adjustment sitting in the back of the plane, rather than at the controls, but I've grown accustomed to it and enjoy reading a book, doing some work or challenging my wife to a game of dominos.
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You don't go to Palm Springs in the summer unless you're building a golf course.
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Great touch is often written off simply as 'talent,' which is crucial, because a good swing can take a golfer only so far. I've seen thousands of fantastic swings in my day, but that doesn't guarantee anything.
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Ever since I bought and started flying an airplane, it's been almost exclusively for business. I love to fly. It's a great joy to me. But rarely do I use it for any kind of pleasure, other than it is a pleasure to fly.
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When you lose the ability to step up and hit the ball as hard and as far as you want, that also affects your ability to will the ball to go where you want it to go, if you know what I mean.
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I never heard Jack Nicklaus say, 'I'm a great player,' or Tiger Woods, as a matter of fact. They just get out and do it. And I think that's far more appealing... than talking about how good you are.
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What do I mean by concentration? I mean focusing totally on the business at hand and commanding your body to do exactly what you want it to do.
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Golf challenges you mentally at any age, and when you become my age, it's a challenge physically to try to make your game work as well as it ever did. That's close to impossible, but that doesn't keep you from trying to hit the ball where you used to hit it and make the putts you used to make all the time.
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I never rooted against an opponent, but I never rooted for him either.
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As my father taught me, and he drove home that point, he said, 'Just remember something. You don't need to tell anybody how good you are. You show them how good you are.' And he drove that home with me. So I learned early not to brag about how good I was or what I could do but let my game take that away and show them that I could play well enough.
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I've always made a total effort, even when the odds seemed entirely against me. I never quit trying; I never felt that I didn't have a chance to win.
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You must play boldly to win.
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As a kid growing up in Latrobe, PA, I could dream about being an Olympian like Jesse Owens or Johnny Weissmuller. I could also dream about being a great golfer like Bobby Jones or Byron Nelson. But the idea of being an Olympic golfer never occurred to me.
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I was mixing iced tea and lemonade in my kitchen since as long as I can remember. It wasn't until some time in the early 1960s that it became associated with me publicly.
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To me, wearing glasses is no pleasure, but once I conceded that I simply couldn't properly judge distance without them, I began to experiment. I tried glasses and found them uncomfortable. I switched to contact lenses, and they also bothered me.
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Golf would be my ticket somewhere, I told myself. I just couldn't say where it would lead me.
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My search for ways to improve my touch has never ended. We players tried a lot of different things and compared notes. Little fads would set in.
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I never felt that I didn't have a chance to win.
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Critics who have said a safer shot here or there would undoubtedly have won me a few more tournaments are probably correct. Going for the green in two was who I was as a boy - and it's who I remain as a man.
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The more I practice the luckier I get.
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The road to success is always under construction.
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I'm not much for sitting around and thinking about the past or talking about the past. What does that accomplish? If I can give young people something to think about, like the future, that's a better use of my time.
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I find myself getting associated with a lot of younger people in the game. I still enjoy playing with them, and I think they still enjoy playing with me. As long as I can stay competitive and have fun doing what I'm doing, I guess I'll keep doing it.
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I started flying because I had a fear of it early on. I figured if I learned to fly, I would understand better what was happening and started taking lessons in the late 1950's, once I had made some money on tour.