Perry Skipping U.S. Open Qualifier To Prep For Stanford St. Paul Championship

...and he's a Ryder Cup hopeful, reports Steve Elling.

Update on 2008-06-01 02:04 by Geoff

Alex Miceli gets Perry to explain his thinking...if you can call it that.

“I don’t do 36 holes ever,” said Perry, citing one reason not to play the U.S. Open qualifier. “I will never do that again. It just wears me out. I’m not physically capable of being – it ruins too many weeks. It ruins my next week and it ruins trying to prepare that week for the tournament. It takes too much out of me.”

Perry made the decision months ago, which is the reason he has played six consecutive weeks and plans to play next week at Memphis, before taking a week off.

“I’ve only played (Torrey Pines) three times in my career so that kind of answers that question. I don’t like it,” Perry said. “Never have.”

Perry missed the cut in 1988 at Torrey Pines and withdrew in 1997. He finished tied for 67th earlier this season.

“I play good at Hartford the week after and at the Buick (Open),” Perry said about his plans after the U.S. Open. “I won Buick and I had chances to win at Hartford. Those are two great courses for me too. So that's kind of how I strategized the whole situation. As much as I would love to play in a U.S. Open, if it would have been anywhere else I would have been after it.”