While the European Tour's HQ has been at Wentworth since 1981, since 2009 their international HQ have been located at the lavish Jumeirah Estates in Dubai, and for those of you who join the annual migration of snowbirds to Florida, or swear by fill in your favourite blank in the Caribbean, or Mexico....you might want to take a deep breath, get international and take the flight to Dubai, one of seven Emirates that make the UAE.
With the never ending riches of oil dwindling and set to dry out altogether Dubai led by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum is bound and determined to be the holiday resort of the world, and there are no shortage of breath taking activities to make your day a memorable one.
Although it's in the desert and you are guaranteed all the sun you can handle, particularly in the summer, you can go snow skiing. indoors no less, or play all the hockey you want, in fact they host Canadian tournaments every year.
Burj Khalifa has taken over from the CP Tower as the tallest, the Dubai Mall is like Rodeo drive on steroids, Burj Al Arab is that 10 star hotel shaped like a sail that has themed rooms (James Bond room, etc) that only the richest can afford, take the kids to Dolphin Bay, Aquaventure waterpark or Wild Wadi Waterpark and they'll love you.
Off road ATVing in the desert, a beautiful Sikh Temple that is the only Gurdwara in the Middle East, or the Jumeirah Mosque, the world famous man made Palm Islands, heck there is even an underwater zoo...on and on it goes..
With generous tax breaks, great weather and a central location for the 27 countries this tour travels to many pros have a home here so it's just a drive to this week's Omega Dubai Desert Classic, where Rory McIlroy lives and is going for a three peat of sorts. He explains...
“It’s always nice to be back in Dubai, and I guess the last couple of times I’ve played here I’ve done pretty well, so I’m sort of going for three in a row in Dubai with winning here last year and then winning the DP World Tour Championship at the end of last season. So it seems to bring out my best golf. I think this is my tenth year here – I played twice as an amateur. So I’ve got a lot of great memories and I get a lot of support here. There are a couple of little things that I took from Abu Dhabi and worked on last week. So hopefully you’ll see my game just a little bit sharper, and I’ll be trying to win again here, win for the third time to join Ernie as the only people to win three times.”
It's a strong field with tour regulars like Henrik Stenson, Graeme McDowell, Lee Westwood, Martin Kaymer, Louis Oosthuizen, Andy Sullivan, Danny Willett and of course Ernie Els making sure it should be a great week..
For years guys like Ernie and Sergio to name just two had to compete with Tiger at every turn and Rory was talking in Dubai about the parallel of that to Andy Murray and tennis I thought you might like to hear..
“You’re not going to find a more driven, more dedicated professional athlete in the world than Andy Murray. He does absolute everything in his power to get the most out of his game. He’s Wimbledon Champion, US Open Champion, Olympic Champion. He’s one of the best British sportspeople ever in my opinion. But he’s been unlucky. He’s come up in an era with Roger (Federer) to start, Rafa (Nadal) and now Novak (Djokovic), and Novak looks like he could potentially be better than all of them. He could win more Grand Slams than Roger and could ultimately be the best ever"
This is the final leg of the desert swing and gets underway in the wee small hours EST Thursday morning and I'll be right here and on TSN1050, Sunday morning covering it and the other desert event in Phoenix with you as always..
Bryan Angus
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