Ángel Ayora started competing in 2025 in the fourth week of the year. When he could. It was the Ras al Khaimah Championship. He would have liked to play the week before at the Hero Dubai Desert Classic, but he didn’t get in. He missed out by very little. He asked for an invitation and had no luck. He wanted to play so much that he was there, at the same Emirates Golf Club, training from the week before. It’s what the Marbella native loves most: training and playing golf.
The week of the DP World Tour Championship was the 46th of the year. That is, Ángel played 28 tournaments in 43 weeks. He barely stopped for fifteen. It’s not crazy. There are players with busier schedules. Ask Sungjae Im or Patrick Reed themselves if you have the chance to cross paths with them.
Okay, it’s not crazy, and even less so for a 21-year-old, but you’ll agree it’s been a very intense end of the season, with seven top 10s in the last ten tournaments, playing eleven of the last thirteen weeks and with the added stress of fighting until the last minute for the PGA Tour card. More than one in his shoes would park the clubs for a good while. That’s not the case for Ángel.
The Andalusian golfer and his team are already preparing for the next season. In fact, if there are no last-minute changes, the plan is to start training again on Thursday. Already. Full throttle. He will have barely let three days pass between the final round of the DP World Tour Championship, including his big decision not to go to LIV Golf announced in the Bola Provisional of Ten Golf, and his return to work. It’s his dream. His desire. His passion. His mission. He wants to be on the PGA Tour and win where Nicklaus, where Palmer, where Tiger Woods, where McIlroy… He’s going for it and is willing to push himself to the limit.
Ayora has seen himself in Abu Dhabi and Dubai with the best in the world and knows he is absolutely up to their level. That image on the 16th hole of the Earth course at Jumeirah on Saturday, looking at the leaderboard and seeing his name in the number one spot, followed by Hatton, Fleetwood or McIlroy, is an image that won’t be easily forgotten. Sensational how he recounted it this Monday in the Bola Provisional. At the same time, he is clear that there is room for improvement and that he must push to earn one of those ten PGA Tour cards next year through the Race to Dubai. That’s why he doesn’t want to waste time and is going to get to work immediately.
He will miss out on the rookie of the year. It’s ‘stolen’ by Martin Couvra by very little. The Frenchman has won a tournament and finished one place ahead. There’s not much more to discuss. However, if you conduct a survey among DP World Tour players, surely, although both are very young, it would overwhelmingly show a brighter and more promising future for the Spaniard.
Ayora doesn’t want to waste time. For this reason, he is going to play the Nedbank Challenge in South Africa in less than three weeks. He will also be at the Alfred Dunhill Championship at Leopard Creek, where last year he was very close to opening his record and will likely end the year in Mauritius, although that will depend on what happens in the two previous weeks. Then, back to work very soon. A few days of rest for Christmas with the family and off to Dubai to play the Dubai Invitational and the Hero Dubai Desert Classic. Finally at the Emirates. The goal is to do as well as possible in these five weeks, give himself a chance of victory, continue regularly visiting the top 10, and get closer to the top 100 in the world to knock on the door of the PGA Championship. It’s not that he’s in a hurry, it’s that Ayora is naturally fast.
