HONOLULU – With golf joining the Olympics for the first time since 1904, the PGA Tour is trying to put together a test event for the new course in Rio de Janeiro.

The tour is having a tough time finding anyone to go because of the crowded 2016 schedule.

“We’ve got a good list of players who are, quote, interested in coming,” PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem said. “But we don’t have a long list of players who are committed to coming. That’s the case with the guys who are currently playing on the PGA Tour, just because of the schedule, looking ahead to the summer, seeing the compaction. So I don’t know.”

The test event is planned for March 8, and the tour has lined up a charter flight for its members.

Every sport must have an event at the Olympic venue ahead of the Rio Games. Finchem said if golf can pull together this outing, it will count as the test event.

“We can do that with any combination of players that are being talked to,” he said. “Also, I think it’s probably most important to get international players. We don’t know how it’s going to wind up. We’ve got transportation issues and a sponsor the next week that’s watching and saying, ‘Am I going to lose anybody?'”

The World Golf Championship at Doral ends on March 6 and is followed by the Valspar Championship, where Jordan Spieth is the defending champion. His agent, Jay Danzi, said the tour approached Spieth about a trip to Rio, but he didn’t want it to interfere with his title defense at Innisbrook.

The European Tour and Asian Tour have a co-sanctioned event in Thailand that week. The LPGA Tour is off, though its best players will be in Singapore on March 6 for the HSBC Women’s Champions.

British Open champion Zach Johnson said he was asked. His foundation has a retreat that week. Jimmy Walker and Rickie Fowler also were approached and decided against a flight to Brazil. It’s a month before the Masters, with tournaments like the Arnold Palmer Invitational, Dell Match Play and Shell Houston Open leading up to Augusta.

Finchem is eager to have the test event, and not just to tick off that box.

“We want to get some good players on there so if there are things we’re not seeing … you know as well I do, we build these golf courses and ‘Oh, it’s great.’ And then you get the best players in the world on there and we’ve got 10 problems,” he said. “They see things you didn’t notice. So we want to get that done.”

He also described the Gil Hanse design as having a “hangover” from environmental protests and legal challenges that delayed the project.

“We want to get the word out that it’s a good golf course,” Finchem said.

HOMECOMING: The Golf Channel on NBC crew will have some fond memories during the CareerBuilder Challenge this week.

Tommy Roy is the lead golf producer and has no small amount of history in the California desert. Roy first worked for NBC Sports at the Bob Hope Classic in 1979 as a volunteer runner. Fourteen years later, Roy made his debut as a golf producer at the 1993 Bob Hope Classic.

Johnny Miller will start his year at the tournament, which also is appropriate. Not only did Miller win the Bob Hope Classic in consecutive years (1973-74), this is where he made his on-air debut as a golf analyst for NBC in 1990.

NBC last had the tournament in 1998. The Bob Hope Classic went to ABC for eight years before becoming a fixture on the Golf Channel.

In some respects, it will be a reunion. Five members of that NBC crew that televised the Hope in 1998 will be back this year – Roy, Miller, Dan Hicks, Roger Maltbie and Gary Koch. Hicks was a tower reporter in 1998. Now he does play-by-play with Miller.

SCOTT’S DECISION: Adam Scott has made it clear over the last several months that the Olympics aren’t a priority. What he hasn’t said is whether he will represent Australia if eligible, which is likely.

“I said it’s not my priority at all, and that means I’ll make a decision at the very last moment whether it fits or not,” Scott said. “It’s not the main focus of the year. It’s not what I built my schedule around. If it fits in good at the time, I’ll play. And if it doesn’t, then I won’t.

The first decision he has to make is on May 6.

Players have been getting emails from the PGA Tour over the last few weeks about the “Registered Testing Pool” regarding the anti-doping program for the Olympics, which is far more stringent that the tour’s program. All players who would qualify for the Olympics on May 6 must be entered in the pool.

If players become eligible after May 6, then they are added to the pool and stay there until the final Olympic Ranking on July 11. But if players choose not to compete in the Olympics, they will be removed from the pool and not allowed to be added at a later date.

ELECTION TIME: Jimmy Walker, Kevin Streelman and Charley Hoffman have been selected to run as co-chairmen for the Player Advisory Council. The two players with the most votes will start a three-year term on the board starting in 2017.

The voting ends Feb. 15.

Others serving on the PAC this year are Blayne Barber, Ricky Barnes, Roberto Castro, Stewart Cink, Graham DeLaet, Harris English, Jim Furyk, Matt Kuchar, Dicky Pride, John Senden, Brendon Todd, Johnson Wagner and Tim Wilkinson.

One streak remains. An international player has never been voted chairman of the PAC.

BELL HONORED: Judy Bell is in the World Golf Hall of Fame and in the history books as the first president of the U.S. Golf Association. She receives another honor this year the U.S. Open as the winner of the Bob Jones Award.

The award is the highest honor from the USGA and honors a person who demonstrates the spirit, character and respect for the game shown by the amateur great.

She was president of the USGA in 1996-97.

Bell played in 38 USGA championships. She played on two winning Curtis Cup teams and was captain twice. The Women’s State Team Championship Trophy was named after a year after her two-year tenure as president.

She was among the first women to become honorary members of the Royal & Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews.

DIVOTS: Padraig Harrington reported no issues with his knee in his first two tournaments since surgery to repair his meniscus. He was 24-under par at Kapalua and Waialae and was par or better for all eight rounds. … The first of three playoff events for the Charles Schwab Cup on the PGA Tour Champions will be held at Sherwood Country Club in Thousand Oaks, California. Sherwood previously held the World Challenge that Tiger Woods hosts until 2013. … The third Latin America Amateur will be held in 2017 at Panama Golf Club. … George Peper, the former editor-in-chief at Golf magazine, has been selected to receive the 2016 PGA Lifetime Achievement Award in Journalism.

STAT OF THE WEEK: Greg Owen has three top 10s in the last year. Two of them were at PGA Tour events won by Fabian Gomez.

FINAL WORD: “Am I not supposed to be grounded? You are who you are. Why change based on anything you’ve done?” – Jordan Spieth.

HONOLULU – Northern Trust is moving its title sponsorship on the PGA Tour from Los Angeles to New York and will become the opening FedEx Cup playoff event next year, which could create a small domino effect of sponsors.

Barclays has decided not to renew its title sponsorship after 12 years in the New York area, according to two people with knowledge of plans for London-based Barclays. They spoke on condition of anonymity because it had not been announced.

Starting in 2017, the FedEx Cup playoff’s first event will be called The Northern Trust. It will keep the previous golf courses, starting with Glen Oaks in 2017 and rotating among Ridgewood, Plainfield, Liberty National and Bethpage Black.

Chicago-based Northern Trust took over in 2008 as the title sponsor in Los Angeles, and immediately helped upgrade the tournament at Riviera, which is regarded among the best golf courses on the tour.

The switch to New York leaves Los Angeles without a title sponsor after this year, but perhaps not for long.

Hyundai Motor America, which had a one-year deal at Kapalua for the Tournament of Champions, has been talking with the PGA Tour about becoming title sponsor in Los Angeles. The company’s U.S. headquarters are a few hours away in Orange County.

If Hyundai were to move its sponsorship to Los Angeles, the winners-only event that traditionally starts the year on Maui still would not be without a title sponsor. Korea television giant SBS signed a 10-year deal through 2019, and it had farmed out the title to Hyundai in 2011.

The tour would look for another title sponsor for Kapalua, and the tournament could be more attractive the way the PGA Tour is trending toward youth. With so many young winners, such as Jordan Spieth, Jason Day, Dustin Johnson and Rickie Fowler, the Hyundai Tournament of Champions had its strongest field in 10 years.

Phil Mickelson stopped playing in 2002, and Tiger Woods last played at Kapalua in 2005. Neither has won a tournament since 2013.

PGA Tour Commissioner Tim Finchem said officials have considered moving the Hawaii swing to the fall for the start of its wraparound season, though all indications are it will stay in January. “I think we’d like to try to keep it where it is and make it work,” he said.

However that plays out, the tour still has a few big corporate holes to fill after this year.

The biggest question is the World Golf Championship at Trump National Doral. Cadillac is not expected to renew its sponsorship after this year, which has raised questions whether the tour will leave the Miami area for the first time since 1962.

The tour has a longterm deal to play at Trump National Doral, though that deal is subject to approval by a new title sponsor. Some of Trump’s inflammatory remarks during his presidential campaign has caused golf to keep its distance. The PGA of America last year canceled its Grand Slam of Golf, which was planned for Trump National Los Angeles. The PGA of America and USGA, however, have not abandoned plans to stage majors at Trump’s courses starting in 2017.

The tour said in a statement last month that it would “explore all options” after this year’s Cadillac Championship ends on March 6.

Deutsche Bank is in the final year of its contract for the second FedEx Cup playoff event outside Boston and is not likely to renew. There have been discussions about reducing the playoffs to three events instead of four.

“I’d say if there’s a way we can do other things in the schedule that relate to that general period of time, it might be a good thing to do,” Finchem said. “The attitude of the players has always been it’s tough for four in a row. And then you also a lot of times are getting close to the Presidents Cup or Ryder Cup. Both, in our view, are big events. You want space between big stuff.

“So I think it would depend on what else could go in the schedule, which is something we’re looking at.”

Conversely, Finchem said the FedEx Cup playoff events have worked well in each market and are growing.

“It’s not like it’s broken, but we’re always trying to do something better,” he said.

Colonial also is without a title sponsor this year after Crowne Plaza did not renew after 2015.

HONOLULU – Fabian Gomez of Argentina closed with two birdies for an 8-under 62, and then made his 11th birdie of the day on the second playoff hole to beat Brandt Snedeker on Sunday in the Sony Open.

Gomez won for the second time on the PGA Tour, and this one was much tougher.

Starting the final round four shots behind, the 37-year-old Gomez ran off seven straight birdies in the middle his round, let Snedeker back in the game with a pair of bogeys, and then holed a 10-foot birdie putt on the 17th hole and a 20-foot birdie from just off the 18th green to finish at 20-under 260.

Snedeker made a 4-foot birdie on the 18th for a 66 to force the playoff.

Zac Blair, who shared the 54-hole lead with Snedeker, had a 10-foot eagle putt on the 18th hole to join them, but it missed on the high side. He had a 67.

On the first playoff hole at the par-5 18th, Snedeker’s 12-foot birdie for the win narrowly missed. Returning to the 18th a second time in the playoff – the hardest fairway to hit at Waialae on Sunday – Gomez went with a hybrid off the tee to stay in the short grass. His 3-iron reached the front of the green and set up a long two-putt birdie.

Snedeker hit driver into a bunker, laid up and hit wedge 10 feet behind the hole. His birdie attempt to extend the playoff slid by to the right.

“It’s frustrating because I couldn’t make putts to win the golf tournament,” Snedeker said. He said leaving his 12-foot putt to win on the first playoff hole “is going to sting today and tomorrow.”

Gomez won the St. Jude Classic last year by four shots and already was in the Masters. This victory will move him just outside the top 50 in the world ranking, greatly improving his chances of playing in the Olympics this summer.

His 62 was the lowest closing round by a Sony Open champion.

Blair saved par from 8 feet on the 16th hole to keep alive his chance, and he almost cashed in with what he called the best 3-wood of his life from 280 yards. “Oh my gosh, that’s so good,” Blair said as he watched it bound forward onto the green to 10 feet. He needed the eagle to join the playoff. It stayed just above the hole.

“One of the best putts I’ve probably ever hit right there on 18,” he said. “Unfortunately, it didn’t go in.”

Si Woo Kim, the 20-year-old from South Korea, was part of a five-way tie for the lead briefly. He closed with one bogey and five parts for a 68 to finish fourth.

Kevin Kisner, playing in the final group for the third time in his last four tournaments, ended his streak of 15 consecutive rounds under par at the worst time. His best putts were to save par until a wild tee shot on the eighth led to double bogey, dropping him five shots behind. Kisner still was in the mix until a bunker-to-bunker double bogey on the 17th ended his day. He closed with a 70 and tied for fifth.

Gomez surged into contention, and then the lead, with seven straight birdies starting with a 12-foot putt on the sixth hole. The Argentine was so dialed in that the next six birdies were all inside 8 feet. But he followed that streak with two straight bogeys, and only the great finish got him into the playoff.

Snedeker and Blair were the only players who stayed with him.

Blair had a share of the 54-hole lead for the first time, playing alongside two of the best putters, and even with that little wiggle in his stance to get comfortable, he rolled it beautifully. He holed a 12-foot par putt on the opening hole and made birdie putts of 35 feet on No. 7, 20 feet on No. 8 and 25 feet on No. 12, the last one giving him a share of the lead when Gomez finally made bogey.

Snedeker came out flat with seven pars and a bogey and twice fell three shots behind. But with birdies around the turn, an 8-foot birdie on the 14th and Gomez making those two bogeys, he was right back in the mix.

He took the lead for the first time all day with a gap wedge he stuffed into 3 feet for birdie on the 16th, but moments later, Gomez made his birdie on the 17th.

In the second tournament since the ban on anchored strokes typically used for long putters, Blair was asked to review his stroke on the 17th before signing his card. He used a fairway metal to putt out of light rough, and a television replay made it look as though the end of the club might have been touching his body.

After a brief review, it was determined the club did not touch his body.

Canada’s Graham DeLaet tied for 7th at -14.

HONOLULU – Même après avoir raté un oiselet de deux pieds au dernier trou, ce ne fut pas difficile pour Zac Blair de voir le positif, samedi, à l’Omnium Sony.

Blair a effectué trois roulés sur la dernière normale-5 à Waialae et a dû se contenter d’une carte de 64, six coups sous la normale, ce qui lui a procuré une égalité en tête avec Brandt Snedeker. Blair est en quête d’une première victoire sur le circuit de la PGA.

Snedeker a raté des roulés pour l’oiselet sur les deux derniers trous pour jouer 66. Ils étaient à moins-16, et ils ont encore beaucoup de compagnie au haut du classement.

Kevin Kisner a commis son seul boguey de la ronde après que son coup de fer se soit retrouvé derrière les tentes corporatives au 17e trou. Il s’est bien repris avec un oiselet au 18e pour jouer 66 et il accuse maintenant un coup de retard sur les meneurs.

Le Canadien Graham DeLaet est à égalité au 13e échelon à moins-10 tandis que son compatriote Nick Taylor occupe le 52e rang à moins-6. Adam Hadwin, de Moose Jaw en Saskatchewan, est 68e à moins-4 et David Hearn, de Brampton en Ontario, est à moins-3 et n’a pas pu terminer la ronde.

HONOLULU – Zac Blair missed a 2-foot birdie putt on his final hole Saturday and had to settle for a share of the lead with Brandt Snedeker.

Blair drilled a 3-wood into the par-5 closing hole at Waialae to just over 40 feet, lagged it short and pulled the short birdie. He still had a 6-under 64 and will have a good shot at his first PGA Tour victory.

Snedeker missed birdie putts of 10 feet and 12 feet on the last two holes for a 66.

They were at 16-under 194.

Kevin Kisner birdied his last hole for a 66 and was one shot behind. He will be in the final group for the third time in his last four PGA Tour events.

Canada’s Graham DeLaet is tied for 13th at 10-under 200.

HONOLULU – A new driver, a new swing and Brandt Snedeker is starting to feel just like new.

Coming off a great weekend at Kapalua, Snedeker played bogey-free Friday and rolled in a couple of long birdie putts that carried him to a 5-under 65 and a one-shot lead over Kevin Kisner after two rounds of the Sony Open.

Snedeker was at 12-under 128.

“I feel like I’m playing great, so it should be fun,” Snedeker said about the weekend at Waialae.

It could be fun for a lot of players.

Two dozen players were separated by five shots at the halfway point. Scoring conditions were so ideal that 87 players from the 144-man field made the cut, meaning there will be a 54-hole cut on Saturday.

Kisner, who played with Snedeker, kept pace with him on Thursday (both opened at 63) and on Friday until a two-shot swing on their 12th hole. Snedeker made a 35-foot birdie putt and Kisner missed a 5-footer for par. Kiser kept his wits even as his putts kept missing. Even though he missed three birdie chances inside 10 feet and had several others in the 15-foot range that caught part of the cup, he hung in there long enough to make a 12-foot eagle putt on his last hole for a 66.

British Open champion Zach Johnson (66) and the resurgent Luke Donald (65) were among those two shots behind, while the group three strokes back included Sean O’Hair and 49-year-old Jerry Kelly. Vijay Singh, who turns 53 next month and can become the PGA Tour’s oldest winner, had a 69 and was four behind.

Dating to his final two rounds on Maui – 65-67 to tie for third – Snedeker is 26 under over his last 72 holes. That beats the way he finished the up last year. He went to the Australian PGA Championship and opened with an 84.

He made a full commitment to an overhaul of his setup, and Snedeker said he worked hard with Butch Harmon and then showed up in Maui early, playing a couple of practice rounds with Jordan Spieth. And it helped that Kapalua’s fairways are among the widest in golf.

“Maui being wide open off the tee a little bit helped me get comfortable with it,” Snedeker said. “And then I realized this week … how it feels, what should happen, and when I do hit a bad shot, I kind of know where it comes from. So I feel way more comfortable with it this week and excited about it, because the bad shots haven’t been near as bad as they have been.”

Kisner was a runner-up in the HSBC Champions and won the RSM Classic at Sea Island in his final two tournaments of 2015, and he started the new year by finishing ninth at Kapalua on a weekend where his putter went cold. And here he is again, contending on the weekend after a year in which he had four runner-up finishes at a victory.

“To go out and play the way I did on Sunday at the RSM with a three-shot lead was a huge confidence builder,” Kisner said. “It wasn’t that favorable that I took a month-and-a-half off after it, but to come back and get right back into the fire and have a chance to win this weekend is going to be huge for me.”

Two-time defending champion Jimmy Walker finished with nine straight pars for a 68 to finish on 3-under 137 and make the cut on the number. He was nine shots back.

Kisner and Snedeker were right of the fairway on the par-4 third, having to punch out low to avoid the palm trees. Kisner’s shot caught a frond and came down short of the green, and he pitched to 5 feet and missed the par putt. Snedeker’s shot ran all the way onto the green, and he holed a 35-foot birdie putt for a two-shot lead.

On the par-3 fourth, Snedeker made a 20-foot birdie putt, and then finished with a good chip out of the rough to 4 feet for birdie on the par-5 ninth.

Kisner’s frustration was starting to get noticeable when he bent over so far that his hands nearly touched his shoes on the fifth, but with that eagle on the ninth, he still was only one shot out of the lead.

“I was proud of the way I stayed patient all day,” Kisner said. “That round could have been a few more bogeys if I’d have let not holing any of the putts get to me, but stayed patient, kept hitting good shots and good way to finish it on 9.”

Graham DeLaet of Weyburn, Sask., sits T36 and leads the Canadian contingent at 5-under 135 following a bogey-free 62. Brantford, Ont., native David Hearn is tied for 47th place at 4-under after carding a 71 on the day, while Abbotsford, B.C., products Adam Hadwin and Nick Taylor are T66 at 3-under.

DIVOTS: All three players who are staying on for the Champions Tour season debut next week on the Big Island – Singh, Fred Funk and Davis Love III – made the cut. … Robert Allenby missed the cut by four shots in his return to Honolulu. He shot a 68 on Friday. That was his lowest score since Aug. 2. … Five players who were at Kapalua last week missed the cut – Russell Knox, Justin Thomas, Chris Kirk, Graeme McDowell and Troy Merritt.

HONOLULU – A month away from turning 53, Vijay Singh showed Thursday in the Sony Open why he doesn’t spend a lot of time with players his own age.

Singh made birdie on his last two holes in gorgeous weather near the shores of Waikiki for a 7-under 63 and a share of the early lead with Ricky Barnes and Morgan Hoffmann. It was Singh’s best score at Waialae by two shots and his lowest opening round in more than three years.

Barnes made four straight birdies at the turn and closed with an up-and-down from behind the green on the par-5 18th, while Hoffman holed a 25-foot eagle putt on his final hole at the par-5 ninth to join the early leaders.

Si Woo Kim of South Korea was another shot back, while Luke Donald and Sean O’Hair were in the group at 65.

Singh won the Sony Open in 2005 when he was No. 1 in the world, a year after the former Masters and PGA champion turned in a nine-win season on the PGA Tour. But he hasn’t won since the Deutsche Bank Championship in 2008, which effectively wrapped up the FedEx Cup.

The big Fijian has been around long enough to realize that a good start is nothing more than that.

“I’ve been playing really well,” he said. “I just haven’t produced the scores. I feel I’m playing well, and see what the next three days bring.”

It helped to hole some long putts, and Singh knocked in a 50-footer for birdie on his third hole. He added a pair of 20-foot birdie putts and a 30-foot birdie putt. More than a good day on the greens, and some solid scrambling at the start, was a book.

He said his body feels better than it has in years, which certainly helps. But he found a book that he has carried with him for the last 20 years that he began reading.

“I haven’t read it for the last 10 years,” he said. “So I picked it up yesterday and started reading a few things that I’ve been doing, and it’s just a different mindset. Golf swing has been the same (so) become a lot more aggressive this year. That’s the plan, to attack the golf course instead of just trying to put it in the fairway and trying to make a good swing.”

The name of the book?

“I can’t tell you,” he said. “I’d have to kill you.”

He laughed.

It was easy to be in good spirits in the warm sun of Oahu and a 63 on his card. Singh is stick around next week for the Champions Tour opener on the Big Island. That’s what of his rare ventures onto the 50-and-older circuit, where he has played only six times since he became eligible in 2013.

Barnes and Hoffman are both trying to win for the first time, and one has been at it a lot longer than the other. Barnes has gone 205 starts on the PGA Tour since he turned pro without winning. He was runner-up at the 2009 U.S. Open at Bethpage Black, and he’s had three third-place finishes in his career.

He had to return to Web.com Tour Finals to get his card back, but making it through and getting off to a reasonable start in the fall were indications that his game was on the right path. He changed coaches 18 months ago to get away from relying on his athleticism to find something more repeatable.

“Some things would click for a round, and then they would kind of go away,” he said. “But I felt like the stuff we are working on now is here to stay.”

Donald made headlines in Britain recently for sharing his thoughts about wanting to quit the game because of the struggles that knocked him from No. 1 in the world to No. 50. He said he was frustrated at the lack of progress, though his wedge game looked sharp at the Sony Open, and that’s the key to getting back in the right direction.

“Those are some fleeting thoughts seven or eight months ago,” he said. “I was feeling a bit down about my game, and I think I was in Memphis in a hard place. And my wife at the time was in Paris with Michael Jordan. I was just thinking I need to be in a higher place in Memphis right now while she’s in Paris. That was just putting it in context.”

Canada’s David Hearn shot 65 and has a share of 9th.

Tim Clark, in his first event since the anchored stroke for long putters was banned, opened with a 66.

Robert Allenby, returning to the Sony Open after a bizarre episode last year that left him with a bloodied forehead, no wallet or cellphone and no memory of what happened, hit his first tee shot out-of-bounds onto the driving range, made triple bogey and played even par the rest of the way for a 73.

HONOLULU – Jordan Spieth has an endorsement with another major company, signing on as a brand ambassador for Coca-Cola.

Spieth is No. 1 in the world and is coming off an eight-shot victory to start the new year. The Masters and U.S. Open champion has his second endorsement with a Fortune 100 company. He also has a corporate deal with Dallas-based AT&T.

Financial terms were not disclosed.

Spieth last year rose to the top of golf with two majors and the Tour Championship, which Coca-Cola sponsors, that gave him the FedEx Cup title and a $10 million bonus.

The partnership with Coca-Cola will cross all forms of advertising, including the “6-Pack of Olympians and Paralympians” leading up to the Rio Games. Golf is back in the Olympics for the first time since 1904.

Proud to join Team @CocaCola and partner with such an iconic American brand. https://t.co/Nf3dhz9fCU

— Jordan Spieth (@JordanSpieth) January 13, 2016

Motivated by his growing family and feeling better than he has in more than a year, Graham DeLaet is happy to be back on the PGA Tour.

The Canadian golfer will be in the field this week at the Sony Open in Honolulu, along with countrymen David Hearn, Nick Taylor, and Adam Hadwin.

DeLaet, who turns 34 this month, played three events in late 2015 as part of the PGA Tour’s Fall Series – the official start of the 2015-’16 PGA Tour season – and earned US$52,795.

After his final putt dropped at the Sanderson Farms Championship in November, the native of Weyburn, Sask., rushed home to more important matters. His wife, Ruby, gave birth to twins – Roscoe Fawce and Lyla Victoria – on the Tuesday after the tournament concluded.

DeLaet admitted he wasn’t grinding on the driving range after his kids were born, but he has played a few rounds with friends near his home in Scottsdale, Ariz.

“The last couple of weeks when I was home, my wife and I talked and I was like, ‘`I have to get working again, it has to happen,”’ DeLaet explained. “My game is feeling pretty good. Right after Christmas is when I got pretty serious again and did a lot of work in those few weeks.”

Now, DeLaet begins a new routine as both a professional golfer and a father. His trip to Hawaii was the first without his children.

“I was so lucky that they were born when they were and I was able to hang out with them for the first two months of their lives. It was tough to leave them, that’s for sure,” he said. “It’s pretty fun though. You have to be selfish as a professional golfer, and for the first time in my life I’m not being selfish and it’s pretty nice.”

DeLaet has also been able to recover from injuries he suffered last summer. A thumb injury forced him to withdraw from the RBC Canadian Open, miss the PGA Championship, and cause him to limit his schedule to 22 events – his lowest total since 2012.

He earned $988,349 for his efforts in 2015 with three top-10 finishes. But it was the first time since 2011 (when he suffered a serious back injury and only played in two tournaments) that he didn’t crack the $1-million mark.

“It was frustrating for sure,” he said. “It was not ideal timing by any means. It was disappointing for it to happen when it did.”

Now fully healthy, DeLaet said his biggest goal of the year is to represent Canada at the Olympics.

“It would be amazing, honestly,” he explained. “No matter who goes for Canada, it’ll be a great team. But I want to be on that team, 100 per cent.”

He sits second in the qualification standings behind Hearn, who is coming off his best season on the PGA Tour. The top two Canadian men in the Official World Golf Rankings at a certain point later this year will be Rio-bound, along with the top two women.

Taylor and Hadwin admit they have similar Olympic aspirations. Both sit within shouting distance of Hearn and DeLaet’s current standing.

“(The) Olympics are definitely a huge goal for me this year,” said Taylor. “I put myself in a position to make a run up the world rankings and hopefully have a chance heading into the summer. It would be an amazing experience.”

Hadwin concurs.

“(I want to) go out each week, put myself in contention and see what happens from there. If the Olympics happen for me this year, then I know I’ll be having a great year,” he said.

Hadwin and Taylor state they feel confident this year – their second season as full-time Tour members. Hearn and DeLaet, meanwhile, are both entering their seventh year on Tour.

And with a renewed sense of excitement on and off the course, DeLaet is eager to get things started.

“There’s a lot of pressure no matter what when you’re playing on the PGA Tour, but I know it’s going to be a lot easier if I play a poor round and my wife is there with our two kids and I can pick them up and hold them,” he said. “I think it’ll erase how bad rounds might feel pretty quickly. I want to play well for them.”

KAPALUA, Hawaii – Robert Allenby returned to paradise with hopes of putting a nightmare behind him.

Allenby has missed the Sony Open only three times in his 17 years on the PGA Tour, and this would have been an acceptable occasion to miss. He went from victim of what he first described as a robbery and kidnapping to the butt of jokes over a bizarre night in Honolulu that left him with a bloodied forehead and no memory of what happened.

So why bother going back?

“I’ve got so many great memories here that I wasn’t going to let one bad one interrupt it,” he said Sunday night after checking into the Kahala Hotel at Waialae Country Club. “I also thought for my own well-being that maybe I could come here and face it and put some closure on what happened last year.”

He had dinner at the hotel with friends and already has his dining plans laid out for the week.

“Room service and (hotel) restaurant,” he said.

The 44-year-old Australian last year missed the cut in the first full-field event of the year, and then went to Amuse Wine Bar with his caddie and a friend. He recalls golf fans recognizing him and wanting a photo. He said police surveillance shows him leaving the restaurant. And that was it.

Whatever happened that night – Allenby says he still doesn’t remember anything during a 2½-hour window – it might have gone unnoticed except that Allenby posted a photo his private Facebook page of a bloody scrape on his head and a swollen eye.

Then came the tale of being tossed from the trunk of a car. Allenby said he was told that by a homeless woman who helped him escape from the park after his story was questioned. A homeless man said he saw Allenby pass out and hit his head on a rock.

He was found unconscious about a block from the restaurant.

Golf Channel cited unidentified sources at a strip club that Allenby ran up a $3,400 tab at Club Femme Nu. However, Honolulu Police Det. John McCarthy said the report was not true and the police investigation showed Allenby was never in the strip club.

Allenby believes someone slipped a date-rape drug into his drink at the restaurant when he was taking photos, which he said explains the memory loss.

A month after the incident, police arrested a Hawaii man for using Allenby’s credit cards. Owen Harbison was sentenced in August to five years.

Through it all, his reputation didn’t help.

He is renowned for a fierce temper on the golf course. Allenby once claimed Anthony Kim was out all night before the final day of the Presidents Cup – after Kim had beaten him badly in singles. He mixed it up with Geoff Ogilvy over who was to blame for a team loss in the Presidents Cup at Royal Melbourne two years later. And he has gone through more than a dozen caddies.

Allenby, however, said he felt as though he went from the victim to the culprit and that it marred the rest of his year.

With 21 victories worldwide – four on the PGA Tour – he made only seven cuts in 29 events and didn’t finish in the top 50 on the PGA Tour. He said he has had nightmares of being chased down a street and that he has sought help from a psychologist.

“I needed it to help overcome the stuff I’ve been dealing with,” he said.

He is using his one-time exemption from the PGA Tour career money list to play this year, so he could have just as easily started next week in the California desert. Until last week, he thought about skipping the Sony Open.

“I’ve always enjoyed coming here, and part of me just wanted to face it on the chin,” he said. “I didn’t want people to think that I wouldn’t come back. Not that I care what people think, but I wanted to come back and play well and move forward.”

Allenby remarried in October in Napa, California, the weekend before the Frys.com Open. His wife had work and did not join him on the Honolulu trip.

He has three top-10s in 14 appearances, including a runner-up finish in 2010 when Ryan Palmer beat him with a birdie on the last hole. He has missed the cut four of the last five years, but still considers Waialae a course he plays well.

“I thought long and hard about not coming,” he said. “But I said to (wife) Kym, ‘I need to go. I want to go.’ I love the golf course. The people are always so friendly to me. I know there will be media and all that, but I’m ready to move on with it. I’m not going to let it bother me. The reason I came here was to play and play well.”