By Chris Dunham, PGATOUR.COM ST. SIMONS ISLAND, Ga. -- Heath Slocum, winner of the inaugural McGladrey Classic last year, returned to the Seaside Course this week hoping to make some progress. Rather than turn his victory into a big 2011, Slocum went to work trying to improve his game and took a couple steps back early this year. The work on his full swing cut into his practice time on and around the greens and that cause his whole game to suffer. He returned to Sea Island without a top 10 on his 2011 record but Sunday’s 4-under 66 left him close. “I have been going back to some of the stuff I’ve done well in the past and that was always the goal, but everything just seems to be getting a bit more comfortable,” Slocum said. “At the end of the day, I just need to make more putts and that’s been my biggest issue this year. I did a better job this week, but there’s still room for improvement. Slocum bogeyed two of his last three holes in Round 3 but made up those shots with two birdies on his first three holes Sunday. He parred his next seven holes but was back on the first page of the leaderboard at 9 under with three birdies between holes 11 and 14. A bogey on the 18th dropped him back to 8 under for the day and probably outside of the top 10 once again. “I played well, got it to 5 under on the day with four to play and one was a par 5,” Slocum said. “I was really trying to get to double digits and maybe sneak into 11 or something and see what happened. But I just couldn’t get a couple putts to drop late. The bogey on the last kind of hurts but overall it was a good week.” With things starting to come back together, Slocum will be in the field next week at the Children’s Micracle Network Hospitals Classic hoping to finish his 2011 season on a high note. “The same thing,” Slocum said of his goals for next week. “Try to improve and go enjoy myself. There’s a tournament there so I want to win and try to get into Maui in 2012. There are a lot of things there next week but most importantly I’ll just try to improve on this week.”