Editor's note: Augusto Núñez earned his first PGA TOUR card with a No. 6 finish on the Korn Ferry Tour Regular Season Eligibility Points List. The 10-year pro received his card, along with his fellow 2022 Korn Ferry Tour graduates, at Sunday afternoon's ceremony following the Regular Season-ending Pinnacle Bank Championship presented by Aetna.

Núñez brought PGA TOUR Digital along for the ride.

One year ago, at this exact same spot, surrounded by almost the same people, able to hear this same excitement bubbling through the air, I lost my Korn Ferry Tour card. One year ago, for the second time in the past two decades, I considered leaving the sport that gave me everything.

Twenty events, 1,157 points and nine top-10s later, here I am, with the Argentinean flag hanging over my back, and my PGA TOUR card waiting right in front of me.

I grew up surrounded by golf in Yerba Buena, Tucumán. My dad caddied at the Jockey Club de Tucumán and soon enough, with my brothers and I, it became a family business. Just like that, at 15 years of age and an entire world to discover, my path to the PGA TOUR began, roughly 5,102 miles from where I’m standing right now, waiting for my name to be called.

Five years of caddying were enough for a friend of mine to get me to the side and proclaim: “We are going to Buenos Aires,” just so I could try my luck as a pro golfer. And what luck that was. In 10 years, I was able to meet so many incredible players that continued to push me all the way from the Argentine Tour, to PGA TOUR Latinoamérica, and to the Korn Ferry Tour. But above all, I was lucky enough to find several homes away from home along the way.

This week was something else entirely ... crossing the clubhouse gates, knowing that no matter what happened, I was already exorcizing the ghosts that had chased me ever since I had lost my Korn Ferry Tour card, that my path to the TOUR was clear, and I would be standing where I am, in line to get my card, just a few players away from being able to hold it.

But also, just like there is always a silver lining, not making the cut this week turned into an opportunity to support one of my greatest friends.

Following Nelson Ledesma as he played his last two rounds, experiencing the tournament once again as a fan, and just enjoying the sport that I fell in love with over 15 years ago was a very fitting way to spend the weekend before the card ceremony. My path to the TOUR has too many layers to focus only on competition.

My path to the PGA TOUR was filled with the love and support I got from my family and friends, who built me up when I was back home just a week ago. Sometimes tough love, sometimes words of encouragement, but always joined by the blind faith I could see in their eyes, in the way they believed in me and rooted for me. Going home was the only thing that seemed right before this week. Going back to my club, gathering strength from everyone that has been with me ever since I got my first club up to now. The Argentinean flag that waves on my back is also for them.

Like I said before, it’s a long way from my country to here. Blessed and grateful as I am to be here, I am not immune to being homesick. And among the great things that golf has given to me, I was lucky enough to have surrounded myself with people that have the ability to take me back home faster than you can say #TOURBound. Be it with an “asado” at our hotels, or with some “mates” driving from one tournament to the other, making Utah to Omaha feel just like a drive from Buenos Aires to Mar del Plata, I wouldn’t trade that experience for the world.

We as players are expected to compete against each other all the time, which we do, but we are also there for each other, no matter what. With Fabián Gomez, I was lucky enough that he had already played and won on TOUR. Being able to get that sort of firsthand advice from a fellow countryman is otherworldly to me. Just the other day during a practice round, I was talking to him and he said something that will follow me all the way to Napa for my first TOUR event at the Fortinet Championship: “We are all the same, here and on the PGA TOUR. You made your way here, why not there?”

I am currently the fifth Argentinean player to have made his way to the PGA TOUR via the Korn Ferry Tour, and I am certain I will not be the last. The talent I see, both here and on PGA TOUR Latinoamérica, even way back home with the players that are just starting their paths, will not let that happen. And I will always do my best to put our flag at the top of the leaderboard no matter what. For all the players that came before me and the ones that will come, I can feel the Argentinean flag waving proud as I walk towards the PGA TOUR.