European Tour aims to lure big names with game's top prize at Dubai finale

The winner of the DP World Tour Championship will now pocket a cheque for $3 million, a jump from the $1.33 million won by Englishman Danny Willett last year.

European Tour aims to lure big names with game's top prize at Dubai finale

(Reuters)





American Brooks Koepka has scooped the biggest individual prize for a tournament in the last two years, claiming $2.16 million for each of his back-to-back U.S. Open victories.

The overall prize fund for the Dubai finale in November remains at $8 million but the field will be cut from 60 to the top 50 on the European Tour's money list.

There are also significant increases for finishing first at the other two season-ending Rolex Series events - the Turkish Airlines Open and South Africa's Nedbank Challenge.

The champion in Turkey will now collect $2 million, up from the $1.16 million won by Justin Rose in 2018, and the following week at Sun City the winner will collect $2.5 million compared with the $1.25 million won by Lee Westwood last year.

European Tour chief executive Keith Pelley hopes the changes can attract more big name players to complete the Race to Dubai.

Last year, world number one Justin Rose skipped the Dubai finale because he had no chance of overhauling eventual winner Francesco Molinari in the Race to Dubai standings.

Only two players, Tommy Fleetwood and Francesco Molinari, still had a chance of winning the season-long money list by the time players arrived Jumeirah Golf Estates for the finale.

"The changes we have announced today in terms of enhanced winner's cheques, Race to Dubai points and Bonus Pool dividend are designed to increase the excitement around the end of the season for our fans, as well as encourage greater top player participation in our final three events," Pelley said.

"...had these additional Race to Dubai points been available over the past five years, on average between five and 16 players would have come to our final event with a chance of winning the Race to Dubai in addition to an average of 43 players having the chance to earn bonus pool money at the end of the season."

He added that both those numbers were considerably higher than was actually the case in those years.

In previous years the top 10 finishers in the Race to Dubai shared the bonus pool of $5 million, but now that sum will be divided among only the leading five players.





(Reporting by Hardik Vyas in Bengaluru; Editing by Ken Ferris)


Share

3 min read

Published

Source: Reuters


Share this with family and friends


Get SBS News daily and direct to your Inbox

Sign up now for the latest news from Australia and around the world direct to your inbox.

By subscribing, you agree to SBS’s terms of service and privacy policy including receiving email updates from SBS.

Download our apps
SBS News
SBS Audio
SBS On Demand

Listen to our podcasts
An overview of the day's top stories from SBS News
Interviews and feature reports from SBS News
Your daily ten minute finance and business news wrap with SBS Finance Editor Ricardo Gonçalves.
A daily five minute news wrap for English learners and people with disability
Get the latest with our News podcasts on your favourite podcast apps.

Watch on SBS
SBS World News

SBS World News

Take a global view with Australia's most comprehensive world news service
Watch the latest news videos from Australia and across the world