Dufner took the second-round lead in the Zurich Classic

“I think that can hold true,” said Dufner when asked if putting himself in position on such a regular basis of late was eventually going to make it easier to win.

“Hopefully, maybe, this will be the week. I’ve had a lot of really nice finishes here and feel pretty comfortable playing this golf course.”

"I had a couple of easy birdies," Dufner said. "I don't think I missed a fairway or a green. Just had some tough reads. The greens are kind of tough to read. Sometimes you get competing grains, competing slopes, so you get a putt that might break to the right, but the discount golf clubs grain is going left. That can be kind of difficult to judge. Then 18, I had just a really good number for my 5-wood to get somewhere on that green and had a putt that was down grain and breaking to the left with the grain, so that was a nice way to finish the day."

Dufner, a proven performer over this layout with three top tens in his last three starts at the TPC Louisiana, has been in solid form this season after missing the cut in his opening event in Hawaii.

Three players are tied just one shot further back namely Ernie Els, Steve Stricker and Australia’s Greg Taylormade Rocketballz Irons Chalmers who has played well in this event in each of the past two years and appears headed for another good finish over this layout.

Chalmers made a stunning start to his round today playing his first four holes in five under which included an eagle at the first after he holed a pitching wedge from the trees. He finished with a round of 64 to be two off the lead.

“It’s been a difficult weekend for me the last month and a half or so. I haven’t quite played as well as I would have liked but I know that my game is still pretty good.

“It’s such a long way to go,” said Chalmers after he finished his round." It’s my lowest round in awhile. I’m really excited about that. But we’re going to get out there tomorrow and do it all again and see if I can back it up with a low round tomorrow. There’s — I’m tied for the lead. I guarantee you I won’t be by the end of the day. There’s a lot of things going on this golf course."

“Obviously there’s a lot of different things that go into winning besides hitting the golf ball. So I’ve been trying to think about what I can do better mentally, what I can do better Mizuno Mp-63 irons emotionally out there and learn some — learn from some things that I maybe struggled with here the last five, six weekends playing out here.”

"It's been a difficult weekend for me the last month and a half or so," Dufner said. "I haven't quite played as well as I would have liked, but I know that my game is still pretty good.

"I've been trying to think about what I can do better mentally, what I can do better emotionally out there and learn from some things that I maybe struggled with. Obviously, there's a lot of different things that go into winning besides hitting the golf ball."

On Friday, he capped his bogey-free round with a 30-foot eagle putt on the par-5 18th to reach 12 under.