Sergio Garcia is hopeful that a successful week at the Omega Dubai Desert Classic can lead to another glorious season after victory here in 2017 fired the starting gun on a stunning campaign.
The Spaniard made his first European Tour start of last season at Emirates Golf Club and held off the challenge of an in-form Henrik Stenson to lift the trophy and set the stage for a maiden Major Championship victory at the Masters Tournament and another win at the Andalucia Valderrama Masters hosted by the Sergio Garcia Foundation.
Stenson is one of a stellar field gathered in Dubai that Garcia will have to hold off if he is to win again but, after two top-25s before Christmas and a win at the SMBC Singapore Open on the Asian Tour last week, the 38 year old is feeling confident.
"The goals are still the same," he said. "Trying to keep improving, keep getting better in all aspects of the game, just like I try to do every year.
"Try to put myself in winning situations like I did last week and try to cope with them the best way possible and give myself chances at winning tournaments.
"I don't know if it's going to be one, six, two, three or what's going to happen but at least if I feel like I'm getting better, like I keep putting myself in those situations, that's already an achievement and then you try to take as many as you can.
"For me last year, winning here against Henrik with Henrik playing well and myself playing well, and kind of keeping him off my back throughout the whole day, I think that was the most important thing mentally.
"That helped me a lot. It gave me more confidence as I went on through the year."
Garcia was not the only European Tour Member to claim an international win last week, with fellow Spaniard Jon Rahm moving up to Number Two in the Official World Golf Ranking with victory at the Career Builder Challenge on the US PGA Tour.
The 14-time European Tour winner is not surprised with Rahm's surge to the upper echelons of the game and sees no reason why he cannot reach the very top.
The goals are still the same. Trying to keep improving, keep getting better in all aspects of the game - Sergio Garcia
"He's a great player, we all knew that," he said. "Obviously he's been on a great run. He's won four tournaments in, I don't know what is it, 16, 17 months that he's been a pro. Obviously he's shown what he's capable of doing. We all see that he's a great player.
"He's got a great opportunity to achieve something, not only for himself but for Spain that hasn't been done for quite a long time, since Seve did it, it would be nice to see it happen.
"We'll see. I'm sure DJ (Dustin Johnson) and some of the other guys that are around that spot would not make it easy on him. So we'll see what happens."
When Garcia won here and then went on to win the Masters, he became the second player in as many seasons to achieve the feat after Danny Willett did it in 2016.
Garcia - along with four-time Major winner Rory McIlroy - has dismissed that link as pure coincidence but Ernie Els, a three-time winner here and two-time runner-up at Augusta National Golf Club, is not so sure.
"It's definitely a drawer's golf course," he said. "It's where my eye found back in the day I could move it easily right-to-left and obviously Augusta is very similar.
"It's very early in the season to compare the winner here to having a chance to win Augusta but there's got to be something there now, with the last two winners winning Augusta.
"I think that's why the field's so strong, too. It's a wonderful field here. All the way from the US and South Africa, all the way around the world, this is really one of the strongest fields running into Augusta.
"Obviously it says a lot for the tournament. It gives the tournament a lot of credibility when Augusta winners come out of here."
