Tom E. Curran • E-mail

FOXBORO, Mass. -

Since entering the league through the service entrance in 2000, Tom Brady has been the Ahab of the NFL, chasing white whales of elusive excellence and impossible perfection.

He's won three Super Bowls, been recognized as the Super Bowl MVP twice, set the single-season record for touchdown passes (50 in 2007), had the greatest TD-INT ratio ever recorded (50 to nine) and has quarterbacked the once laughable Patriots to 100 wins and 27 losses since taking over.

Proof of his monomaniacal focus was that Brady earned one of the Patriots' coveted parking spaces every year from 2000 through 2007 for his participation in the offseason conditioning program. The best player in football outworked fringe players in March, April and May every year so that A) he'd be in ridiculously good shape and B) his teammates would be motivated, shamed or required to work almost as hard.

But after the Patriots' record-setting 2007 season ended in Super Bowl heartbreak, Brady took a pass on establishing the parking lot pecking order.

"I gave it up," he said on Thursday, the first day of Patriots training camp. "I didn't compete for it this year. I am sure if I would have competed I would have won, but I chose not to compete."

And ... why?

"I think there are other things that have come up in my life that I had to make choices on," Brady explained. "One of the choices was to spend time away with things that I don't get the opportunity to do in the offseason. It was not all vacation, though."

Immediately, one would assume the "other things" would involve his supermodel girlfriend Gisele Bundchen and a full slate of jet-setting. There was some of that, as gossip sites showed. But Brady also has an infant son, John, with actress Bridget Moynahan, and Brady spent a large chunk of time in California with him in the offseason.

This time, the parking space could wait.

But with the dawn of training camp, Brady's focus has returned to taking care of football business, especially after the soul-crushing Super Bowl loss to the Giants.

"We were all disappointed with the way it ended -- there's no doubt about that," he acknowledged. "That is part of competition. You can't always control the outcome. You control how much you put into it, and I know this team put everything it could into it. I think that is part of what helps you move forward is to say 'OK, we did the best we could do and it didn't turn out the way we would have liked, but sometimes that happens.'"

After setting an NFL record for points scored with 589, the Patriots managed just 14 in the Super Bowl. Brady was under intense pressure all day from the Giants' front-four and, playing on a tender ankle, had a good game but not a great one.

"It was one game last season that we all felt we could have played a little better," he shrugged. "You can't change what happened; as hard as you want to, you can't. So what can you do? You can move forward with the awareness that you can improve. We are going to try to improve in all phases. There are a lot of improvements we need to make as a team to be able to compete as hard as we can. This is a tough league with a tough schedule and a tough conference. Those teams are always trying to beat us, and it has been like that since I have been here."

Special feature Darkhorses Tom Curran looks at which teams may shock you in 2008

Amazing as the Patriots' 2007 numbers on offense were, 2008 could be (gulp) even better. The orientation process between Brady and wide receivers Randy Moss and Wes Welker is over.

"We now know what everybody can do," Brady said. "We know what everybody is capable of. Last year when we broke the huddle, guys were running to the right or the left because that is where they had to go. They are trying to figure out how to run the routes and find out what I am looking for.

"Now when we get in the huddle, I tell Randy [Moss] what to do and he knows exactly what you are going to do. It is the same with Wes [Welker] and Jab [Gaffney]. It is pretty much everybody. That leads to better execution, and if you can execute more consistently then that will help over the long term. There are a lot of guys who can do it really good for one play, but it goes back for one play. You want to do it well and right as often as possible so nothing inhibits you from scoring."

Being able to do it well –- historically well –- every single season has been the hallmark of Brady's career. And after all he and the Patriots have accomplished, he isn't about to get in the business of using one game -– Super Bowl XLII -– as a new white whale.

"I don't think about proving anything to anybody except proving that we can work hard," he concluded. "You don't focus on proving people wrong. You just focus on doing the best you can do. You control how much effort you put in when you are on the practice field or in the meeting room. You control the effort you put out. We focus on that. No matter what anybody thinks or says -- it doesn't matter. As much as I want to think it matters or you guys [media] think it matters, it really doesn't. We are going to control what we can control, and that is the attitude we take with our preparation, effort and attitude."

Brady doesn't need a primo parking spot to prove he means it.