Rejuvenated Perry ready for Champions Tour debut

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Kenny Perry, who turned 50 two months ago, is playing his first Champions Tour event this week.

THE WOODLANDS, Texas -- First tournament of the year. First round. On the way to the first tee.

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Kenny Perry hit his last practice putt before heading to the tee at the SBS Championship, looked down and ... the putter head was doing a 360. The shaft had rusted from the inside out and finally snapped over the ball bearing that held the putter head.

So much for the old magic Ping Craz-E. And, it turned out, so much for the year.

"It all started right there,'' he said. "I went into a funk putting this year. I putted poorly all year. I re-shafted that putter four times and sent it back to PING, kept sending it back, and it never got the right offset, never got the right look. It never looked the same again.''

Perry finished in a share of sixth there, then wandered through 2010. Nothing horrible, nothing great. No putter felt good and the groove issue meant a new set of clubs. Everything but his 3-wood.

It translated to burnout. Pretty much a lost season.

Until now.

Perry has a spring in his step and a smile on his face this week. He's happy to see all the guys he looked up to back in the day, happy to say he's about to be a proud grandpa in February. He even gets a chuckle out of everyone calling him rookie.

And golf? He's never been so ready.

Perry turned 50 a little over two months ago and is making his Champions Tour debut at this week's Administaff Small Business Classic. He played the PGA TOUR through The Barclays, then took six weeks off to let a few nagging injuries heal up, hang out with his wife and their grown children and, of course, work on his classic cars.

The latest beauty in the lineup? A black and white 1957 Chevy with a 700 horsepower engine. He can work on the drive trains and engines. But body work? Not so much. That, he farms out. But he does know this car will get up and go.

"It's got a license plate,'' he grinned. "But I'm not sure how legal it is."

Perry, however, is signed, sealed and delivered to the Champions Tour. Yes, he'll duck back to the PGA TOUR from time to time -- definitely, he said, the Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial and the Memorial Tournament presented by Nationwide Insurance, both tournaments he's won on courses he loves -- but his future is now. And, yes, he's looking forward to "hanging out" with playing partners Tom Kite and defending Administaff champ John Cook for four-plus hours.

"I'm just anxious to get started,'' Perry said. "I want to continue to push hard. Do I want to be the best player that I can be or do I want to just slack off a little bit and enjoy what I've done and not try to press so hard? Just be some questions I'll have to kind of answer in the off season.

"My focus has changed. I was thinking I was wanting to win 20 times on the PGA TOUR, but it just seems like I went flat this year for some reason. Finally in all of the years I competed and felt like winning, needed to win, I always felt like I needed to win. I didn't feel like I needed to win this year for some reason. I don't know why.''

Perry, who won twice in 2009 to give him 14 career wins, missed the cut in the season's last two majors, then finished T68 at The Barclays. The next week, he withdrew from the second event in the PGA TOUR Playoffs for the FedExCup -- the Deutsche Bank Championship.

"Just had flat hit a wall,'' he said. "Just mentally, physically. I was hurting. I was having back issues, knew issues, elbow. I went and saw Dr. (James) Andrews on, my right elbow. Just a few little aches and pains that just kind of bothered me a little bit."

He's healthy now and joins Steve Lowery as the newest kids on the block for 2010. And, no, they don't jaw back at the veterans who simply have to tease the rookies.

"I have a big bark, let's put it that way,'' Perry said. "I don't have not much bite most of the time. I like to talk and chat and razz the guys a little bit. I like to have fun.''

University of Houston-ex Fred Couples, who is also in the field, set the bar pretty high for the 2010 rookie class. He won three times early in the year, lost another tournament in a playoff and finished second or third five other times. And there was that T6 at the Masters. Perry has two events to simply get started.

"It's hard to believe I'm 50,'' Perry said. "Still feel like a young man. So I'm excited. I mean, it's been a neat two days since I've been here. I've had all the guys coming up and welcoming me to this tour. Hale Irwin, Mark O'Meara. The who's who of golf. All the guys I looked up to my whole career and who made me the player that I am, and they're all here playing.

"Their advice to me was, You're really going to like this. It's going to be fun. It's going to be totally different from the PGA TOUR. I can kind of sense that from all the guys. They're very relaxed, very laid back, and they're all out having a good time."

Perry knows The Woodlands CC. Like most players, he teed it up here in the Shell Houston Open when it was played here. He made the cut just once in five tries, finished T36 in 1998.

"This course, it's tough, difficult,'' he said. "There's a lot of water, a lot of risk/reward holes, and it's playing identical to when I played back here in the late '80s.

"It's in great shape. It's the best shape I've ever seen. Greens are perfect. Fairways are full. You know, I was hoping the tees would be a little closer on the par 5s. I was expecting to hit mid iron, and I'm not hitting that. Everybody's going to say, It's a lot shorter. It's not. It's a little shorter.''

The bottom line? He's not worried. He's excited. He's smiling. He's ready.

"Just going to try and rekindle the fire a little bit,'' he grinned, "and see where we're at next year.''