Race to Dubai set for thrilling climax with DP World C’ship

Major players have touched down in Dubai as an elite field will close out the 2020 European Tour season at the DP World Tour Championship at Jumeirah Golf Estates, where a Race to Dubai winner will be crowned on Sunday afternoon.

2018 Masters winner Patrick Reed is in pole position in the Rankings and a host of stars lie ready to strike, including tournament debutant Collin Morikawa - winner of the US PGA Championship in August - and former Race to Dubai winner Tommy Fleetwood.

Reed sits 460 points ahead of second placed Fleetwood, but with 2000 points on offer for the winner of the tournament, mathematically any of the leading 60 available players on the Race to Dubai Rankings, plus Joost Luiten in 72nd position, could become Race to Dubai Champion with victory.

American Reed has been in fine form of late, finishing in a share of third at the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth Club in October and a share of tenth at The Masters last month. He also a good record on the Earth course, with three top tens in four starts including a share of second place two years ago.

Fleetwood has finished second and third in the Race to Dubai since he won the title in 2017 and finds himself in with another chance this year having posted two second-placed finishes at the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship and the Aberdeen Standard Investments Scottish Open - both Rolex Series events.

Meanwhile Morikawa, who is third in the Rankings, has burst into the limelight this year with a first Major title at TPC Harding Park in San Francisco and an additional victory on the PGA Tour at Muirfield Village in Ohio.

The 23-year-old Californian is excited ahead of his debut and is looking forward to playing more European Tour events in 2021.

“It’s wonderful to be here and the Earth course is beautiful,” he said after the Pro-Am on Tuesday.

“There’s some really tricky greens out here and the fairway bunkers are pretty penalizing so you’ve got to hit the ball really well, keep it in the fairway and then go on from there.

“It would mean a lot to win this week and take the Race to Dubai and it would be huge for my career to be able to ‘check off’ another tournament and milestone. Hopefully I can come out on Sunday as the winner.” Sitting in fourth place in the Rankings is two-time Race to Dubai champion Lee Westwood, who is nursing a sore back ahead of Thursday’s opening round.

“I’m at about 75 per cent so far,” said Westwood, who won the DP World Tour Championship and Race to Dubai in 2009. “I’ve been struggling with my back since The Masters. I’ve had treatment with the guys here and today (Tuesday) is the best it has felt for three weeks.

“It’s nice to have a chance, and to win the Race to Dubai for a third time would be amazing. I’m 48 in April next year, and it shows if you keep yourself fairly fit and retain your enthusiasm and mental capacity for the game, you can carry on playing to a high level for a long, long time.”

Meanwhile at the other end of the age scale are two debutants who, like Morikawa, have won on the PGA Tour this year and are ending their campaigns in Dubai. South Korean 22-year-old Sungjae Im impressed with a runner-up finish at The Masters last month and won his first PGA Tour title in Florida back in March while 23-year-old Norwegian Viktor Hovland lands in Dubai in top form having won his second title in Mexico last week.

Another youngster arriving with that winning feeling fresh in his mind is South African Christiaan Bezuidenhout. The 26-year-old won back-to-back titles in his homeland over the last two weeks and will tee off on the Earth course in fifth place in the Race to Dubai with a real chance of clinching the season-long competition.

Add into the mix the likes of modern day Ryder Cup legends Ian Poulter, Graeme McDowell and Martin Kaymer, and past DP World Tour Championship winners Matthew Fitzpatrick, Danny Willett and Henrik Stenson and the 2020 European Tour season is set to go out with a bang.

The Race to Dubai is a season-long competition to crown the European Tour’s No 1 player.

Celebrating the global connectivity of Dubai and the European Tour, the list of champions since 2009 reads like a Who’s Who of modern-era greats, including three-time winner McIlroy and Stenson with two titles, as well as Jon Rahm, Molinari, Fleetwood, Kaymer, Luke Donald and Westwood.

Formerly known as the Order of Merit, points are accumulated based on a tournament points system with the winner awarded the prestigious Race to Dubai trophy at the conclusion of the DP World Tour Championship.