Open Champion Louis Oosthuizen returned at the Dutch Open to show all that he was not ready to rest on his laurels for the remainder of the year.
Despite an excellent finish in Sweden the week after he lifted the silver claret jug, Louis has been lower profile since and understandably so. But he showed his class again in Holland with a top five finish and I’m sure he will be going higher and higher before the season ends in Dubai.
Another on the ascendancy is David Horsey, who was tied fourth with Louis behind Germany’s Martin Kaymer, the US PGA Champion. David is very much an achiever and I doubt that his win in Germany earlier this summer will be his last this year.
We had a total of five players in the top 20 with Shiv Kapur and Chris Wood both 11th and Darren Clarke 17th. Clarkey is my partner at the Alfred Dunhill links this year (event chief Johan Rupert having pulled rank to snatch my regular companion Lee Westwood) and I’ll be having a word with him soon to ensure he ups his birdie quota by the time we reach Scotland.
On the other side of The Atlantic, there isn’t too much positive to report about the FedEx Cup with Rory McIlroy not having qualified for the Tour Championship final and Ernie Els unable to go for the $9million jackpot now despite having been top of the rankings for most of the season.
Ernie was undone by a last-hole triple bogey in Chicago and now goes to Atlanta in eighth place while only the top five have a chance to lift the jackpot. That can’t be right.
It is strange to me that the FedEx seems to reward just the players who have a good four-week stretch in the play-offs rather than those who perform consistently well all season.
Exciting times though for European Tour golf because as well as having three major champions this season, we also have a chance of having the world No.1 come the end of October.
The form of Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson since Lee Westwood started his injury lay-off in early August, means that Lee will start his comeback at the Ryder Cup knowing that he has the chance to become the world’s best a few weeks later.
Neither Phil nor Tiger will be playing much after the Ryder Cup so that gives Lee the opportunity to up his ranking to the summit of the game. It’s a very exciting prospect.
On the Challenge Tour, we had two promising performances. Charlie Ford cemented his position in the top 20 who automatically qualify for the main tour next year by finishing 11th in Kazakhstan while Steven Tiley lifted his chance of progressing by moving up to 26th after finishing seventh.
Sadly, one of the horses I have an interest in with Lee is not on the up like our golfers. Hoof It was having none of it at Doncaster races and finished dead last. Well he didn’t actually die, just ran like he was about to.
