SLIPPERY ROCK — Ryan Prokay has little time for anything but golf these days.

Whether it is driving the fairways at Mohawk Trails Golf Course in New Castle or chipping onto the greens at Glenmaura National Golf Club near Scranton, Prokay's summer has been filled with chips, putts and a lot of driving — both on the golf course and on the highway.

"It's pretty hectic this time of year," says Prokay, a Slippery Rock native and a soon-to-be senior at Grove City High. "In the last three weeks, I've played in seven or eight tournaments, some of them two rounds. I've played about 12 rounds of golf."

That's 216 holes of gut-wrenching, competitive golf. While his friends are lounging on the sand, Prokay is wedging his way out of it.

Prokay, though, is no stranger to the grind. Last year, he entered every tournament he could, and in June won the Western Pennsylvania Golf Association Junior Championship — the same tournament Arnold Palmer once won.

While it was the best thing that has happened to Prokay on a golf course, it also made an unexpected negative impact on his golf game.

"I got a little too high after that win," Prokay said. "After that, I was playing in tournaments and wondering why I wasn't playing better. I kept think that I won that tournament, I should be playing better."

It took Prokay some time before he just stopped thinking and started playing golf again.

This summer, with that renewed approach, he is off to a stellar start.

Two weeks ago, he fired a 6-under-par, 66 to win the P.J. Boatwright Junior Qualifier at Mohawk Trails by four strokes.

At the time, he was told it was a course record. Later, he discovered it was three strokes off the mark.

No matter. Prokay felt good again.

"Sometimes I get into one of those zones where I hit it and it goes exactly where I want it to," Prokay said. "That's when I don't really think as much as when I do when I'm not clicking. Unfortunately, that doesn't happen very often. But, boy, when it does, it is fun."

Prokay is searching for that happy medium between the in-the-zone Ryan and the scuffling Ryan.

Right now, the needle is pointing a little too close to the scuffling Ryan for his tastes as he prepared to play in the three-round WPGA Junior Tour event at Penn State University's Blue Course starting today.

But even in a slump, Prokay is still shooting scores in the low- to mid-70s.

"I'm not going to lie," Prokay said. "I'm getting frustrated. I have probably lipped out 15 putts in my last three rounds."

It's hard to fine-tune the game with the hectic schedule.

Prokay said he has probably carved out only two or three good practice days in the last month

In July, things will slow down enough for him to iron out some of the hitches in his swing, chips and putts, he said.

The biggest thing Prokay has learned following his big WPGA championship wasn't on the course, but between his ears.

"I learned I have to stay even," Prokay said. "Not get too high or too low. That's the hardest thing to do. I'm not there yet, but I'm working on it."

Prokay will get plenty of practice.