In case there was any doubt, it has now been confirmed: the ‘leadership’ of the European team in the Ryder is closely following Eugenio López Chacarra. Last week, in Belgium, he played in the group with Francesco Molinari, one of the lieutenants of the captain, Luke Donald. This week in Austria, he will play the first two rounds with the captain himself, Donald, who is present at the event. The third player in the group will be the young Frenchman Martin Couvra, who also played alongside Chacarra and Molinari in Belgium.
It couldn’t be clearer, and it makes perfect sense. After all, the emergence of the Spaniard on the European circuit this season has been significant, considering he had no status and was able to win in India in his second appearance of the year on the circuit, thanks to an invitation. Apart from his participation in the PGA Championship, where he didn’t make it to the weekend, it should be noted that he has comfortably made all the cuts, and his worst result was 31st last week at the Soudal Open, to the point that it has only taken him six tournaments to position himself 15th in the Race to Dubai and, therefore, with all the options intact to obtain the PGA Tour card for the year 2026, which is undoubtedly one of his main objectives right now.
Just like last week in Antwerp, the European circuit players are going to play another rather short course this week, the Gut Altentann Golf Club (it doesn’t reach 6,400 metres), and it has been significantly lengthened compared to the one played in the nineties (this course hosted the first three editions of the Austrian Open and then hadn’t been the venue again). The course is a collection of postcards, a beauty, although most of those present agree that the most outstanding and challenging part of the course is the last third, where the design really shines, is more challenging, and numerous and interesting water hazards are concentrated.
The course is very heavy, as a lot of rain has fallen in recent days and is likely to continue until the weekend, so it plays very wide and also facilitates second shots to receptive greens. In any case, the fact that it is a par 70 (there are two par 5s converted into long par 4s for the tournament, holes 6 and 12) will help prevent scores from going too far under par, in addition to that challenging final stretch from hole 12 to 18, where abrupt and interesting changes can occur on the leaderboard on Sunday afternoon.
