Grand plans put Dubai at center of European Tour

2007-11-19

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November 19, 2007

By Mark Garrod Special to PA SportsTicker

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (Ticker) - The European Tour is to stage the world's richest golf tournament in Dubai - but not until November 2009.

Confirmation of the $10 million Dubai World Championship and an Order of Merit bonus pool worth the same amount came Monday.

"This is so much more than a tournament sponsorship," European Tour chief executive George O'Grady said.

"It is a long-term partnership which will see the European Tour and Dubai joining together to significantly enhance the game worldwide and take golf to a new level for spectators everywhere."

The Order of Merit will be renamed The Race to Dubai and the number one player will receive - at the current exchange rate - a bonus of $976,562.

Coupled with the tournament first prize of $813,798 it means that one putt at the end of the week could be worth nearly $1.8 million.

Not that that is a record in these lucrative times for golf. When Tiger Woods won the Tour Championship on the PGA Tour in September he earned himself almost $5.5 million - $615,000 for the event and a $4.8 million annuity bonus for topping the FedEx Cup standings.

Nevertheless, the Dubai announcement is a significant milestone in the development of the European Tour, which for so long has been hoping to hit back at the financial clout of the American circuit.

The first five years of their new partnership with Leisurecorp, the company developing Dubai's leading residential golf community, will also see the construction of a new international headquarters for the European Tour and the creation of a global property company to develop new tournament venues around the world.

The inaugural Dubai World Championship will take place at Leisurecorp's Jumeirah Golf Estates between November 19-22 on either the Fire or Earth course.

Both have been designed by Greg Norman and the complex also includes a Water course designed by Vijay Singh and a Wind course carrying the names of Norman, Sergio Garcia and American designer Pete Dye.

The agreement signed between Leisurecorp and the European Tour includes an option to extend for a further five years.

Fittingly, the deal was announced at Dubai's Burj Al Arab Hotel, at over 1,000 feet the world's tallest hotel and one which has characterized itself as the world's only "seven-star" property.

"The scale of this agreement is testament to the vision of Dubai and its ruler His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, who has recognized the dynamic role golf can play in developing the global profile of this amazing city," O'Grady said. "It is also testament to Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem (chairman of Leisurecorp's parent company Dubai World), who has been instrumental in turning that vision into reality.

"The Race to Dubai will bring a new dimension to the European Tour, creating great drama and theatre throughout the year as all the best players in the world are given the opportunity to compete in the world's richest tournament."

As with the current season-ending Volvo Masters at Valderrama in Spain the Dubai World Championship will be restricted to the leading 60 players on the European money list.

O'Grady's mention of "all the best players in the world" being given the chance to play is presumably therefore in the hope they will look at their schedules to see a way of becoming a European Tour member.

World number one Tiger Woods is designing his first course in Dubai and has played in the Desert Classic there four times - he won the title last year and was third in February - but he has never been eligible for the Volvo Masters because he has not played 10 other European Tour events in a season.

However, the change to the US Tour schedule so that the FedEx Cup finishes in September has created an end-of-year opportunity which the European Tour is keen to capitalize on.

World number two Phil Mickelson won the opening event of their 2007-08 season in Shanghai two weeks ago and talked of travelling more now that his children are older. World number five Ernie Els controversially missed the Volvo Masters at the start of this month even though he was leading the Order of Merit.

He played in Singapore instead and admitted after winning the $1 million first prize - still golf's biggest - at the HSBC World Match Play at Wentworth that "at the end of the year you've got the wheelbarrow out - you want to cash in a little bit".

He has already described the Dubai World Championship and bonus pool cash as "absurd", but quickly added he would be as keen as anyone to get as much of it as he can. The figures on offer outstrip those currently on offer at the four majors.

The Open is the richest of those at the moment at $4.2 million, with the Masters, US Open and US PGA all $3.4 million this year.

The US Tour's Players Championship is the richest single event at the moment, offering a purse of almost $4.4 million.

Whether the powers-that-be in the States now try to get to $5 million before the first Dubai event - 24 months away - remains to be seen but it is very possible.