VIRGINIA WATER, England (PA) -- Justin Rose hopes some home comforts will help kickstart his season.

Last year's European Tour Order of Merit winner is back in England this week for the big BMW PGA Championship, the flagship event on the European Tour, at Wentworth.

The tournament, the largest on the European Tour outside the British Open, will be the 27-year-old Englishman's first in Europe this year and he hopes the return to familiar surroundings will help him rediscover his best.

"I have been in America for five months now," Rose said. "Coming back to England is a real opportunity to recharge my batteries sometimes, to catch up with friends.

"Just doing English things -- watching a bit of football, a pint down the pub, bacon sandwich, going for a curry. Just getting back into the English lifestyle, it's good," he added. "Last year Wentworth was a key week for me in terms of a platform for a good year, so I am hoping it will, again, be a good tournament for me to get some form going."

Rose led after the first round at the Masters in April, but has otherwise not produced the performances he believes he is capable of on the PGA TOUR so far this year.

He has pleasant memories of Wentworth, however, and went close to victory in the BMW PGA Championship there last year before losing to Dane Anders Hansen in a dramatic playoff.

"Wentworth is one of my favorite courses," Rose added. "I've been going to the tournament there since I was a kid. The BMW is the flagship event on the European Tour; there is no bigger event, really.

"It is ranked really high on my priority list and it is a golf course I really like playing, too. It is well worth making the trip back from America to come and play," he explained. "Results-wise the last few weeks have been disappointing but before that things were very much on track.

"I'm trying not to spend too much (time deliberating) on the last couple of weeks and just work my way back into a positive frame of mind," he said. "I went up to Wentworth yesterday, which was lovely because I had the course to myself. The course was in great shape and I had a really good practice round. Everything is feeling good."

Rose was speaking at London's O2 Arena. There to promote the tournament, he had been hitting balls off the dome roof with Simply Red singer Mick Hucknall.

"I am really looking looking forward to the BMW PGA and I've had an exciting morning at the O2 Arena," he said of his unusual preparations for a tournament. "It's been a one-in-a-lifetime experience hitting balls off the top of the building.

"I felt like James Bond -- arrive by boat on the Thames and then scale the O2 dome. It's been a cool day."

On Hucknall's performance, he added: "He's just taking up the game, so it was a bit of a baptism of fire for him, but he was game for a laugh."

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