DP World Tour : Turkish Airlines Open
The European Swing kicks off as the DP World Tour heads to Türkiye for the first time in six years at the Turkish Airlines Open.
This is the eighth edition of the Turkish Airlines Open. Regnum Carya is the venue once more after playing host 2016-2018 while Turkish Airlines continues its relationship with the event, having been title sponsor for every edition.
The fourth of the five Global Swings in Phase One of the Race to Dubai gets under way this week, with the European Swing kicking off in Antalya.
After English domination saw John Parry and Laurie Canter take the Opening and International Swing titles, respectively, it was Japanese Keita Nakajima who won the Asian Swing. Like those three, the winner of the European Swing will not only earn entry into all events in Phase Two of the Race to Dubai, the Back 9, but also take home a $US 200,000 bonus.
A short but spectacular history
The Turkish Airlines Open may only have seen seven editions since its inaugural staging in 2013 but it has certainly made its mark.
That first edition had Tiger Woods in the field at Montgomerie Maxx Royal but he could not beat Victor Dubuisson to the title, with the Frenchman winning again in 2015.
In between it was a HotelPlanner Tour graduate called Brooks Koepka who won en route to the Sir Henry Cotton Rookie of the Year Award and a subsequent five Major titles.
A move to Regnum Carya in 2016 brought a victory for Thorbjørn Olesen and the event joined the Rolex Series in 2017, with Justin Rose winning the first of back-to-back titles.
The last edition in 2019 saw a return to the Montgomerie Maxx Royal and Tyrrell Hatton ensured that every winner of the Turkish Open would also be a Ryder Cup winner as he won a six-man play-off under the floodlights in one of the most dramatic finishes in Tour history.
Rooftop tee returns
One of the headline-grabbing features on our previous trips tp Regnum Carya was the 16th tee. Why? Because it is on the roof of a villa! When alterations were made to the course to accommodate the construction of villas, the decision was made not to move the tee but to incorporate it and the 469 yards the par four now plays is barely altered from its original length.
And the players are not the only ones who have to climb the stairs at the side of the villa - the tee is real grass and it takes several greenkeepers to carry a hand mower up the steps to give it a trim.
edit**** The whole idea of staging this event at one of Turkey's most famous resorts, and paying Tiger a King's ransom to come over in his prime in 2013 to open it, was to grab a share of the lucrative European tourist golf money that traditionally flows into Spain and Portugal in the winter months from the UK and other cold northern European countries.
Covid meant a ban on travel, so the event went on hiatus until this year.
Golf is not a significant sport amongst the general population in football mad Turkey.
europeantour.com
Bryan Angus (edit)
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