In the 2014 season, there were 999 drives of 348 yards or longer. Not one of them belonged to Zach Johnson. His average drive is so far back of that you almost need a range finder to locate it. Certainly a measuring device would come in handy if comparing Johnson's typical drive, 273 yards, to the longest poke of last season, 424 yards, belonging to Bubba Watson. 

The Plantation Course at Kapalua is 7,452 yards this week, a perfect playground for guys like Bubba Watson, not Zach Johnson. He was tied for 193rd in driving distance in the 2014 season with his modest average.

Nevertheless, Johnson is defending champ at the Hyundai Tournament of Champions, despite being distance challenged off the tee. Surprisingly he's not deterred by the differences.

"I used to think this golf course wasn't in my favor, but the more and more I play it, the better I feel like it is suited to me, depending on wind situation and that kind of thing," he said.

Johnson's secret, like that of Steve Stricker, who has also won at the Hyundai venue, is staying in the short grass as often as possible.

Johnson's driving accuracy for last year was 80 percent on 1,346 drives. He's in sixth place behind the likes of David Toms, Jim Furyk, Tim Clark, Heath Slocum and Justin Hicks. Like the Energizer Bunny, he just keeps charging along, albeit, from farther back in the fairway than the long hitters.

He is also is a fighter. He's Jim Furyk in an Iowa jersey.

"I'm never content, whether I'm playing great or playing average or bad," he added, "Just the fact that I just love to compete.  I mean I really—I'm not saying these guys don't because they're all champions, great players—but when I get into I guess you'd say into a mode of where I'm in control of my game and you get into the weekend and you get into Sunday and there's obviously a chance to win, I just—I relish it, I savor it. I mean if anything I don't—I mean I want it."

One reason he has won 11 times on the PGA Tour is that he has a team that helps him look at what he's doing well and what he can still improve on in terms of his on-course performance. They just finished their annual review of everything from his stats to his workout routines.

When he played mini-tours, Johnson said he did not want to do a lot of changing or thinking, much less working out.

"I was reluctant to really work out a lot thinking, man, it's going to change my body, I'm going to be a mess. Well, couldn't be further from the truth. I need it," he admitted. "After my rookie year, I didn't do much. I did stretching occasionally and some tissue work, but I didn't do much of anything and I was beat up at the end of the year. So that was a good example right there where I needed to get that kind of thing taken care of. "

Now the annual review includes both the physical body as well as the numbers. His results from last season may surprise.

"Went through a number of stats, looked at last year, looked at this year," he explained. "We kind of have two or three, three or four goals each year statistically, but then within each goal there's kind of some objectives that kind of help you accomplish those goals, and I can tell you I was seven out of 12, so that's pretty good."

He said one area that was not good last year was putting. This from a very good putter.

"My putting was very average, at best. Actually, it was a drop from the previous year," he said. "So that's going to be the main emphasis this year in formulating a plan that way with the putter."

He was 68th in overall putting average in 2014. He was not even in the top 80 in Strokes Gained Putting. (Source: PGA Tour)

(Strokes Gained Putting: The number of putts a player takes from a specific distance is measured against a statistical baseline to determine the player's strokes gained or lost on a hole. The sum of the values for all holes played in a round minus the field average strokes gained/lost for the round is the player's Strokes gained/lost for that round. The sum of strokes gained for each round are divided by total rounds played. [Source: PGA Tour].)

He said his ball striking was a highlight.

"I know it doesn't wow anybody, but it was really good. My driving actually was great. My greens in regulation was terrific. My wedges were, go figure, really good. My putting was very poor. So that'll be the emphasis this year," he said.

After the golf performance analysis, they go into a review of training, physical conditioning and scheduling of time. That has to be meshed with Johnson's desire to spend time with family.

"The stage of life I'm in right now, I've got three kids that are at an age where I feel like I gotta be at home at lot," he added. "I just feel like I can't practice like I once did. And so when I go practice, it's gotta be very focused, very time efficient, very effective."

His secret to attempting to squeeze everything in is to stay on a schedule. And he means by the hour, every day or most every day.

"I'm not saying I should treat it as a nine to five," he said, "but there's other things that need to fall into place too. You gotta schedule rest, you gotta schedule workouts and tissue work and all that. So scheduling was a big part of the discussion."

His team uses Shotlink, realizing, as he pointed out, that the numbers are not all 100 percent accurate.

"It says I've got a four‑footer when I've got a tap‑in or something like that." 

They take the numbers, plug in formulas, and out comes Johnson's year in numbers.

"From there we can ask him to look at this, look at that, then formulate a plan. He's been using the Strokes Gained Stat since 1992, 1991," Johnson explained. "I can't speak on behalf of everyone else, but for me, what I've learned and what I've known is I need help.  I mean I just need help in all aspects, I mean whether it's technical help, accountability or just motivational help, I mean I need it."

Kathy Bissell is a Golf Writer for Bleacher Report. Unless otherwise noted, all quotes were obtained first-hand or from official interview materials from the PGA Tour, USGA, R&A or PGA of America.