Hello to all.  Here I am in Saint Louis on my couch thinking about my year in 2011 and what lies ahead in 2012.  This is always an awkward time of year for professional golfers because we are fresh off our season and already beginning the preparations for the coming year.  After my 2 week sabbatical from the game when I got home from Europe I finally picked up a club December 20th.  I have had some great competition with some of my good friends around town and old teammates from Mizzou.  My game has been a bit rusty from lack of practice, but I feel really energized and excited about starting things off in 2012 in a great fashion.  Last year, I took a bunch of time off at the end of 2010, and started the 2011 season off rusty, but really refreshed.  This year, I didn't take quite as much time off, but I wanted to make sure that my game is really in good form from the moment I put a tee in the ground in 2012.  I can tell you one thing, I have a lot of inner burning drive heading into this year, so I am really ready to get the ball rolling in Hawaii in early January.
    I read a quote not too long ago by the painter Andy Warhol.  He said, "As soon as you stop wanting something, you get it."  I find this really to be true for what goes on in my head with golf.  Over the course of my professional golf career playing full time on the PGA Tour has been everything I have ever wanted.  Everything I do in my life, from nutrition, to exercise, to outworking everyone on the range, to being strong mentally has all been directed to this goal of playing successfully on the PGA Tour.  I believe it is great to have goals that you set out to attain, but the way I have been trying to accomplish this I strongly believe needs some tweaking.  I have been so one dimensional in my practice the last few years in terms of all the time that I am putting into my game I am banking mentally on that being the "fuel/ingriedients" that is going to take me to the next level on the PGA Tour.  Now, by no means am I saying I need to just cut loose, go start eating cheeseburgers, skip practice sessions, and just turn up to the golf course and see what happens. 
    I still need to practice every bit as hard.  However, I want my practice habits to serve an entirely different purpose.  I want to come home from the gym, golf course, or wherever it is and just feel good about getting better at the game that I love.  Golf is so simplistic, and I often times lose sight of that.  It is flat out just a game.  No man has ever conquered it and no man ever will.  While golf is my job, I want 2012 to be all about me just loving the process of really loving the game of golf and becoming the best golfer that I can be.  The PGA Tour isn't a result of outworking everyone, the PGA Tour will be a result from getting back to the grass roots of the game for me.  Playing golf because I love it.  I have more that enough talent to play out there full time, I just need to harnass that talent in a new light.  That is where I am headed in 2012 and I look forward to everyone of you enjoying the ride with me.  Thanks for reading and it really is going to be a great year.  My year.    

    The European Tour was not to be this year.  I had a poor tournament start to finish and could not get it done.  Starting the 3rd round I knew I had to make a move early and that is exactly what I did.  I was 4 under through 5 holes.  I had an eagle putt on my 7th hole and three putted for par.  That momentum killer rattled me a bit and I made some unforced errors after that.  I closed the final round with an uneventful 78 that mimicked the previous three days of poor play.  In fact that final round was the highest round of my 97 competitive rounds of the year.  I guess you could say it was a fitting end to the torment that my week in Spain offered me. 
    That is the beauty of golf.  There will be times of ecstasy and times of pain.  This one was obviously the latter.  I had a 5 hour train ride up the coast of Spain to digest what had happened and thoroughly examine my year.  I was able to see the big picture during this time of self examination.  What I was most excited about was what really counts for the most:  my scoring average.  I crunched the numbers and I finished the year with a 71.70 scoring average.  This was my best year of scoring since I turned professional in 2007 by a whopping 0.4 strokes.  In 2009 when I was within 2 strokes of winning the Nationwide Tour event in Springfield, Missouri I had a stroke average of 72.11 for the year.  This tells me that if I can continue to improve moving forward like I have been, I just need to be in the right place at the right time and I will undoubtedly give myself some really excited chances to win some tournaments.
    So where do I go from here?  After being on the road essentially week in and week out since February it is time for a break on the golf front.  I'm not going to pick up a club for two weeks and am going to enjoy the time away during the Holidays.  I have a great friend getting married in January in Hawaii.  It works out perfectly for me to attempt the Sony Open qualifier while I am down there.  Besides that the NGA Tour (formerly the Hooters Tour) begins play at the end of February.  So I am in the midst of my off season.  Once 2012 gets here I am going to be really excited to pick up where I left off.  It was a year of steady play, but now I am ready to take it the next step and start winning some tournaments.  Until then I wish everyone a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.  I firmly anticipate 2012 being the best year yet.  Thanks for reading and for your support in what I am going to accomplish.

    Two rounds in and it has been an unfortunate struggle.  The first day was absolutely ideal.  Sunny and zero wind.  I posted a poor five over 76 to really dig myself an early hole in perfect scoring conditions.  Today it was cold and breezy.  Despite a comedy of errors, I was even par through 15 holes playing the par 5 16th with a wedge in my hand hitting my third.  I spun a wedge off the green to a low lying area.  I proceeded to make a double bogey 7 from there and pared my way in for two over 73.  I was moving back in the right direction with the tough conditions, but the 16th hole really stung.
    The good news is now I know exactly what I need to do.  I am going to have to play absolutely exceptional golf the last 1/2 of the event in order to get into the top 20.  It has been done before, so I just have to go out there one at a time and knock some flagsticks down.  I'm not going to quit even though the last two days have been painfully agonizing.  Thanks for reading and I really really want some positive news to be in my future tomorrow.  I need to let it just come my way without pressing. 

    Hello from San Javier, Spain.  Michael Wellington and I have just completed our two practice rounds around El Valle Golf Club in the far southeast portion of this country and are excited about getting after it the next four days.  The course itself has a complete desert golf feel to it that you would compare to the golf found in Arizona.  I feel great about the state of my game, so all I can do from here on out is go out there and let my talent shine forth.  It is my goal from the moment I wake up tomorrow to the moment I hole out on the last hole four rounds from now to have the best attitude of any golfer in the field.  Michael and I have been talking about just being loose, walking with confident strides, having great body language, and talking positively at all times.  Any adversity we will just shrug off and keep steamrolling forward. 
    We made it to Spain Tuesday morning after close to 24 straight hours of travel.  We took a 2 hour flight to New York, then a 7 hour flight to Barcelona, followed by an hour flight from Barcelona to Alicante.  We then rented a car and drove 1 hour and 30 minutes to the resort we are staying at.  The course is in a very rural part of the country so it was difficult to find, but luckily we have GPS that pinpointed exactly where we  needed to go.  The food over here actually is very good.  There is a grocery store some 300 yards from our hotel which has been very convenient.  Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwiches are definitely going to be a staple this week.  I hope all is well back home and I look forward to reporting back with some quality news as the week progresses.  Thanks for reading!