Wednesday 6 April 2016 10:56, UK
Jordan Spieth says watching The Masters on television when he was young helped him win the tournament last year.
Experience is usually the key to winning at Augusta National yet, 12 months ago, the American was handed the Green Jacket after making only his second appearance in the tournament.
This followed a remarkable debut in 2014 when he finished in a tie-for-second and he claims that, by watching the event on television, it proved to be an important part of his Masters education.
Speaking on Tuesday, Spieth said: "I've actually played quite a few rounds. I've played the golf course 25, 30 times now.
"Also, I've just kind of had an eye for it. I've also studied it from when I was eight years old, certainly the back nine.
"And the coverage of the front nine is far superior now than it was back then. It was so much focused on the back nine. Now everyone knows every hole.
"So I already knew the tendencies of different holes and I just wanted to hit these putts that I've seen guys hit or shots into holes where the ball feeds.
"I love courses where you have to use your imagination and a lot of feel, so I just kind of had a unique eye for it I guess, a passion for it, if you want to say."
Aged 21, Spieth became only the second golfer in 36 years to triumph on just his second start in the tournament last year.
Two months later he won the US Open at Chambers Bay, after which there was talk of Spieth securing the Grand Slam.
In The Open Championship at St Andrews he tied-for-fourth, missing out on a play-off by just one stroke, before finishing second in the PGA Championship.
He added: "We were so close and it was one break here or there. We got the breaks this week, and we certainly got the breaks at the US Open. It was a golf course where you needed to get breaks at Chambers Bay.
"I had control of my own destiny at The Open Championship. And then the PGA, I'll use an excuse right now and say there was a three‑stroke difference in the draw - and I finished three behind.
"You need those kind of breaks. You have to have everything go your way to win a golf tournament, let alone to win a major, and then for that to happen the four times in a year in those four weeks.
"I got as good of breaks as I could last year and didn't pull it off. But we were very close. I think it can happen but if someone wins the first three majors, it's going to be very difficult to shut out the noise by the fourth and to still play your own game."
