Could this be the Best Year Yet for Canadian PGA Member Mike Weir?

The Canadian Press - Mike Weir doesn't see any reason why this won't be his best year ever on the PGA Tour.

The Canadian lefty already has a top-10 finish this season after taking seven months to accomplish that last year and feels as good about his game as he has in a long time.

Weir's gold standard for a season is 2003, when he won the Masters and two other events while climbing all the way to No. 3 in the world rankings and earning more than $4.9 million (US).

Still, it wasn't perfect.

"My game back in 2003 was still a little inconsistent and felt like it could get better," Weir said Monday on a conference call. "I think it is a lot better now.

"Now, it's just a matter of the rest of my game keeping up with that - particularly making enough putts. I need to make a few more putts. But ball-striking wise, I feel a lot better."

That's important because it means he needs to spend less time pounding balls on the driving range.

Weir had one of his tougher seasons in 2007 because of all the time hours he logged while practising his new stack-and-tilt style of swing with coaches Andy Plummer and Mike Bennett.

"It was a grind last year," said Weir. "I worked really hard. It seemed like after every round I was working on my swing and then I'd have to squeeze in time for short game.

"It was almost overload - six days a week for that many weeks I was just grinding away. It kind of wears you down."

The hard work finally paid off in the fall as he was the star of the President's Cup in September and won the Fry's Electronics Open a few weeks after that.

Those breakthrough performances have set the stage for what he hopes will be a great 2008. With his swing feeling so good now, Weir has had more time to fine-tune specific parts of his game.

"My real focus this year is to really spend a lot more time on my short game," he said. "That's what really paid dividends I thought at the end of last year.

"Just the extra little bunker save, the extra up and down, the extra couple six-, seven-footers made - (that) makes all the difference in a round."

Weir was in the hunt at the season-opening Mercedes-Benz Championship, where he held the 54-hole lead before being passed in the final round and finishing fourth.

His next PGA Tour victory will be the ninth of his career, giving him the most ever by a Canadian. It's reasonable to expect that it will come this year because of the way Weir is feeling but he's not taking anything for granted.

Even though the 37-year-old believes this could be the best season of his career, he hasn't set specific goals about top-10 finishes or tournament wins.

"My goals are more geared towards my preparation and things I see in my golf swing that I'm trying to improve upon," said Weir. "There's still some things that I want to get better at.

"So they're more along those lines than outcome goals because I know if I do these other things that those outcomes will happen."

One of the events Weir looks forward to every year is the RBC Canadian Open.

This year's tournament returns to Glen Abbey in suburban Toronto for the first time since 2004, when Weir squandered a three-shot lead in the final round and lost to Vijay Singh in a playoff.

It's now been 54 years since a Canadian won the event and Weir is eager for another opportunity to end that drought.

"I'm really looking forward to it," he said of the July 24-27 tournament. "I hadn't played well up until 2004 at Glen Abbey and I proved to myself than I can play there and shoot some good scores there ...

"I've got to put 2004 behind me and I've got to think about the good things that happened that week - not what happened at the end."

Weir fell ill during last week's Buick Invitational and was forced to withdraw after just nine holes. As a result, he's decided to enter this week's FBR Open outside Phoenix - which means he'll play each of the next four weeks.

That is something he would normally try to avoid but Weir says he's "chomping at the bit" to play. It's little wonder given that his swing is in top form and that he can count on the West Coast weather being a little nicer than it is at home in Utah.

"Everything feels good about my game," said Weir. "I'm kind of sick of the snow and sick of skiing now, so I'm ready to play."