The journey towards a lifetime pass down Magnolia Lane began in a Dodge Intrepid.

This was the car Zach Johnson drove across the heartland of America to find golf tournaments to play in a career that only looked promising to the guy behind the wheel.

"It was a boat," Johnson said. "But I loved it. Bought a CD player to put in it and I was all set."

The destination was not to one of golf's famous datelines like Pebble Beach or Augusta, but remote places like Beatrice, Nebraska, and Salina, Kansas. He toiled on the Teardrop Tour, the Dakota Tour and even something called the Prairie Tour, which no longer exists. He eventually graduated to the Hooters Tour and the Nationwide Tour.

A good year meant he had enough money left over to pay back a group of investors from Iowa who financed his dream, and he managed to do that five out of six years in the minor leagues.

Prosperity was found in faith, not in a bank account.

"That's what made me what I am today," Johnson said. "Playing on the Hooters Tour, the Nationwide Tour, the Prairie Tour. Long days in the car, long days on the range. Paying entry fees."

Standing inside the locker room at the Mid Ocean Club, Johnson paused from reliving his early years as a professional and shook his head, still having a hard time believing that a tiny tournament in a tiny town in Nebraska eventually would make him a Masters champion and bring him to Bermuda with the other major champions of 2007 for the PGA Grand Slam of Golf.

"It's weird," he said. "It seems like yesterday. But it also seems like 20 years ago."

It would have been unfathomable to think he could go from the Prairie Tour to organising dinner for Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Tiger Woods, Ben Crenshaw, Phil Mickelson and the rest of the Masters champions on a Tuesday night at Augusta National.

Stranger still is looking back to that chilly afternoon in April when Johnson poured in birdie putts on the back nine with Woods, Retief Goosen and others trying to track him down.

"They're both fantasies," he said. "One fantasy is looking back to those days on the mini-tours and thinking, 'No way it can happen.' The other fantasy is looking back now and saying, 'I can't believe it happened.' My wife and I still, to this day, are like, 'Wow, we won the Masters?' It's still mind-boggling. It's still unreal to us."

Let that be a lesson to some unknown grinding away at state opens and mini-tours that look like a road to nowhere. Or to some kid who never got recruited to a major college, or who never had the means to train at a golf academy.

"I'm from Cedar Rapids, Iowa," Johnson said when he won the Masters. "That's about it. I'm a normal guy."

Truer words were never spoken.

Johnson is not an imposing figure, and a green jacket doesn't change that. He is not the most physically gifted golfer, certainly not cut out of the same mould as Woods or Mickelson or Ernie Els, who were dripping with golf talent before they got out of high school.

Johnson is simply a product of hard work and a lot of belief. He modelled his game after Jim Furyk, a former US Open champion in Bermuda as the first alternate. Furyk doesn't overpower a golf course, but he gets by on determination and strategy, good putting and great iron play.

Talent helps, of course, and that's one thing any major champion has.

Damon Green noticed it in a few casual rounds they played in Orlando, Florida, during the offseason before Johnson reached the Nationwide Tour in 2003 and set a record with $494,882 to win the money title and finally reach the big leagues.

They were at a club repair shop when Green offered to help Johnson find a good caddie for his rookie season on tour. Johnson wanted Green, who already had a good job and a steady cheque working for Scott Hoch, who had earned nearly $7 million in the previous four years.

"I got to thinking that if I let someone like this get through my fingers, I might never forgive myself," Green said.

He said Hoch pointed out that winning the Nationwide Tour money list is no guarantee of success on the PGA Tour, but Green saw enough skill and determination that it was worth the risk.

"I had to see some potential of doing this, and it was nice to see that premonition come to fruition," he said. "It was pretty cool."

Obviously, Johnson isn't the first golfer whose path to glory was not paved in gold. Rich Beem also played the Dakota Tours and even sold car stereos in Seattle before he found his way and captured the PGA Championship at Hazeltine. Tom Lehman went from mini-tours in California to South Africa and Asia and nearly quit to become a college golf coach when he gave the PGA Tour one more try.

Todd Hamilton spent what seemed like a lifetime in Asia, going from Singapore to Pakistan to Kuala Lumpur before he cashed in at Royal Troon to win the British Open.

However, Johnson stands out in this four-man field as a normal guy capable of extraordinary things, and someone who hasn't forgotten where he came from and who helped him get there.

His guest list for the Grand Slam includes a support team that has help keep him grounded, from mental coach Morris Pickens to swing coach Mike Bender to putting instructor Pat O'Brien to fitness guru Chris Noss.

They met last week to review the year and to map out plans for 2008, as they have done the last several years.

"The positives outweighed the negatives," Johnson said, unable to contain a smile.

He was still smiling when he stepped out the door and into the sunshine, looking out on the 18th fairway and the endless view of ocean, still wondering how he got here and where it will lead.