Awaiting the DP World Tour to kindly include Ángel Ayora in the rankings for the European team of the Ryder Cup, an X-file that remains without official explanation, the Malagueño continues with his own business, that is, climbing in the rest of the classifications. In the world ranking, for example, he has placed himself at 195th, matching his best position ever. Additionally, in the Race to Dubai, he has climbed a step and is eighth. Precisely, his good performance in the Alfred Dunhill Championship, where he finished fifth, and the points he earned there for the Race to Dubai, have allowed him to aim for an extra prize in Mauritius this week, which only the Spaniard and three other golfers aspire to.
We are referring to the Opening Swing. As you know, since last year the structure of the DP World Tour calendar took a slight turn. The season was divided into five different swings, called Opening, International, Asian, European, and Closing. Each of these swings consists of between five and eight tournaments and has an individual winner. The champion of these swings or mini tours receives a financial bonus of 200,000 dollars and the extra prize of entering all the tournaments of the Back Swing, the final part of the European calendar that brings together a good portion of the best tournaments of the year, including the Irish Open or the BMW PGA Championship.
Well, with the AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open taking place this week, the Opening Swing, the first mini tour of the season, concludes, so we will know the first winner of those 200,000 dollars, as well as the classification for the Back Nine. At the moment, after the Leopard Creek event, the leader of the Opening Swing is the American Johannes Veerman, mainly because he won the Nedbank Golf Challenge, the tournament that distributed the most points in this initial part of the calendar and in which only a small group of players participated. Ayora, for example, did not play it because he did not qualify due to his category.
Veerman has a good chance of winning this Opening Swing, but there are still four players, Ayora and three others, who could snatch this distinction from him. Specifically, they are those competing in Mauritius and are within a distance from Veerman in the Race to Dubai equal to or less than 500 points, the bounty received by the tournament winner this week.
In this scenario are the aforementioned Ayora, John Parry, Ryan Van Velzen, and Marcus Kinhult, interestingly three of those who fought for victory last week in South Africa. The calculations are simple. None of them will settle for anything other than winning the tournament. If Ayora, Parry, Van Velzen, or Kinhult win in Mauritius, they will also claim victory in the Opening Swing. If none of them win, the triumph will go to Veerman.
In Ayora’s case, more than the 200,000-dollar cheque, which is not bad at all, what would really be significant is securing his presence at the BMW PGA Championship in Wentworth from December, an event where his presence is not guaranteed today with the Challenge Tour category. Additionally, he would also secure a spot in the Hero Dubai Desert Classic, a tournament where he should theoretically enter with his category, although it is never certain. If he wins the Opening Swing, there is no need for further calculations, as beyond qualifying for the Back Nine, he would receive the prize of a spot in the next Rolex Series, in this case, the event at the Emirates Golf Club in Dubai.
