Spanish golf had serious chances this Sunday to add its 211th victory on the DP World Tour at the Irish Open, with Ángel Hidalgo starting in the star match just one shot behind the leader, Alfredo García Heredia two shots behind, playing ahead alongside Rory McIlroy, the eventual winner, and Rafa Cabrera Bello starting four shots back. There was even a remote chance for Ángel Ayora, who started seven shots off the lead, provided the young Andalusian delivered something like the best result of the day and the leaders faltered. It wasn’t to be. We remain with 210 victories, waiting to increase that count in a hot autumn.
However, the bounty the Armada takes from the K Club is much more than interesting. Surely García Heredia will find that twelfth final position with a final score of 76 strokes to be very little, but at least he has climbed 18 positions in the Race to Dubai (now 151st) and, above all, he takes excellent general feelings for upcoming events. He is still far from the ‘permanence’ threshold, currently set at 113th in the ranking, but it is evident that he has found the right path, and that despite having played very affected by severe back pain.
Cabrera Bello, for his part, has definitively turned around a tough and hard-fought season. This third place in Ireland has taken him to 63rd in the Race to Dubai, after gaining 45 positions, so the struggles to maintain playing rights disappear automatically and now the Canary Islander can focus, much more calmly, on securing, for example, a place in those final play-offs of the European circuit in Abu Dhabi and Dubai.
Something very similar has happened with Ángel Hidalgo, although he was not fighting against the stress of permanence, as his victory in last year’s Spanish Open secured his playing rights until 2026. In any case, he jumps to 73rd in the ranking and will also be able to fight with guarantees for that place in the tournaments in Abu Dhabi and Dubai.
Finally, the fifth position of Ángel Ayora also opens up new and appetising horizons, as he has reached 29th place in the Race. To begin with, he has absolutely secured his presence in those final play-offs in the Emirates, which in itself is quite an achievement in his rookie season.
But moreover, and here’s the good part, this boost puts him right in the fight for those ten PGA Tour cards that are distributed on the DP World Tour at the end of the season, after the Dubai final. Right now, to put us in context, the tenth of those PGA Tour cards is held by Japanese player Keita Nakajima, who is 19th in the ranking and has 241 points more than Ayora, a significant but by no means insurmountable margin. Let’s consider that at this stage of the calendar there are many points at stake and that, for example, a solo second place grants 555 points. Ayora himself, with this fifth place in Ireland, tied with another player, has added 193, and Cabrera Bello or Hidalgo, with their tied third position, have added 281, to give us an even clearer idea.
Finally, Manu Elvira, with a twentieth final position at the K Club, has gained three positions in the Race and is now 52nd, increasingly likely to get into those final play-offs. And his brother Nacho, who finished 29th in this Irish Open, has gained five places in the Race and is now 79th.
