Australian Open champion Jordan Spieth believes his playoff win at Royal Sydney is the exact pressure test he needed to push on into 2017 and take his game to another level.
While it was two clutch par putts that saw Spieth join locals Cameron Smith and Ashley Hall in a three-way playoff on Sunday, a perfect tee- and second shot at the first extra hole pleased the American far more as he lifted the Stonehaven Cup for a second time.
With two wins earlier in 2016, Spieth had already enjoyed the kind of season any touring professional would be proud of.
But he knows what a second triumph in Sydney could mean after he took the momentum of his 2014 Australian Open victory into the Hero World Challenge where he recorded a 10-stroke win, and then powered to one of the most memorable seasons on record.
"I hope to take this into a couple of weeks from now, improve on areas that need improvement and sustain what was solid," Spieth said Sunday evening.
"From there, then address what the goals are for the next year. I'm not exactly sure yet, that's normally what we do in the month of December is figure out what we're looking forward to in 2017.
"But I think a lot can be drawn back on 2014 into '15. So it's really nice to, again; the way we played the playoff I think is going to do wonders for me. I've been in a little bit of a stall hitting shots when they mattered.
"[At] Colonial, I saved myself with a lot of putts...to hit those two shots in there right where I wanted to hit them. And then to make the putt with it is really big going forward, and it's something I can draw on all next year is look back on the way this one was finished out."
Spieth has been constantly reminded of his meltdown at The Masters since it occurred back in April, and he was again asked about it after his victory at Royal Sydney.
While he didn't buy into talk the fashion in which the win came could help "bury" his Masters capitulation, Spieth said it augured well if a similar situation arose down the track.
"Yeah probably, it's kind of old news. Until I get back there [Augusta] again, I'm sure it will come back to me again there, I'll get plenty of questions about it then," he said.
"Yeah I still had clutch swings, I just had one bad one. I didn't hit the ball at all well that week and was still leading by four or five shots with nine holes to go
"But to answer your question, it's been kind of something that, it's very difficult to do. I mean you can't practice for being very nervous; you can't get on the range and say, 'okay, get nervous' -- it doesn't work that way.
"It just comes through experience and it just seemed that my tendencies were always to get underneath the ball and miss it right. And so I just committed to my swings the last couple of times today, in that playoff, and that is tough to do when the left's trouble because you think you're going to hit it left - it's uncomfortable. But they went right on line.
"Now I know that and I think that's going to do wonders going forward."