A revived and refreshed Brandon Stone credited his "old faithful" putter for his return to form as he carded his lowest round since the very start of the season at the Danish Golf Championship.
The South African began his campaign with a 64 on home soil at the Alfred Dunhill Championship and while he maintained a bright start to the season, he has made just two cuts since May while missing his last four.
In the three-week break since firing rounds of 70-75 at the Corales Puntacana Championship, he has been back to South Africa and he revealed he got his "head back to neutral" after spending time with friends.
But equally important may be the return of his trusty PING PLD, which he affectionately calls Black Betty, as he explained after an opening 66 at Great Northern.
"That kind of score has been on the cards for me for quite a while, I've just been struggling on the greens," said the Rolex Series winner,
"I had a little bit of time at home, a little bit of time in the bush on a hunting trip with the boys, kind of got the head back to neutral.
"Brought the old Black Betty back in the bag, the old faithful and she worked like a charm today. Black shaft, black grip, black head, my PLD she worked like a charm today. I didn't really miss much, holed some great putts out there.
"Any time you're holing some putts you're going to build some confidence and shoot a nice score.
"You kind of get a bit lost in the process of trying to find the answer. I went to a broom, went to a centre shaft putter and nothing really worked and when I went home I just said, 'let's just go back to what we grew up using as a kid'. And it seems to have done the charm so far this week."
Stone's 66 contained four birdies and two bogeys in his first 14 holes but then went birdie-birdie-eagle before coming to the rarity of a closing par three.
He made his par but admits it was not exactly routine and believes the 18th could provide some captivating drama over the weekend.
"When you stand up on the 18th tee box, that tee box is just so daunting, that green is tiny, the wind is blowing out of the left and you just want to make a good swing of it," he said.
"I hit it so fat and I just prayed as it's in the air and it's got over by a couple of feet.
"Finishing on a par three like that is just setting up for drama and that's what we want. That's what everyone wants to watch when they're sitting on their couch on a Sunday afternoon.
"You've got a par five in 17 and then if you offered me three more threes on 18 I'd be over the moon regardless of what the rest of the rounds look like.
"It's just daunting, today especially. That breeze pumping out of the left-hand side, back-left flag, deep bunker on the left and all the water in Denmark to the right.
"It's going to be great, no matter where that flag is you know they will all feel nerves."
The closing hole is just one feature of Great Northern, which this week becomes the 466th venue in DP World Tour history.
It has already garnered some rave reviews from the players and Stone is thoroughly enjoying the test.
"It's got so many similarities to what we've played across the world but at the same time it's distinctly unique," he said.
"It kind of feels like you're at Le Golf National but it's got a little bit more teeth around the greens sometimes.
"You can definitely see a little bit of Albatross in the Czech Republic that we've played before.
"Every single guy in the players' lounge is like, 'if we can come back here every year, we'll be over the moon'. It's a great golf course."
