El PGA Tour ha puesto este martes la primera piedra de una de las reformas más profundas de su historia reciente. La junta directiva ha aprobado una serie de recomendaciones del Comité de Futuro de la Competición que darán forma a un nuevo modelo competitivo a partir de la temporada 2028. Un PGA Tour de dos velocidades, con dos series claramente diferenciadas, ascensos, descensos, más dinero en juego y un calendario diseñado para que los mejores coincidan con mayor frecuencia.
The central idea of the new system is meritocracy. Players will move between two categories: the PGA Tour Championship Series, reserved for the elite, and the PGA Tour Challenger Series, which will act as the main access route. In other words, from 2028 the PGA Tour will have a structure much more similar to a league with promotion and relegation.
The PGA Tour Championship Series will be the top tier. It will include roughly 23 to 24 tournaments, including THE PLAYERS Championship, the Majors and the international team competitions, Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup. The season will be played roughly between February and August.
Each regular event in this series will have a minimum purse of US$20 million, around 120 players, no alternate lists and no sponsor exemptions. Events will be played over 72 holes, with a 36-hole cut for the top 65 and ties, although the PGA Tour leaves the door open to special formats.
The circuit already has ten of the fifteen regular tournaments lined up for this new Championship Series in 2028. Remaining spots could come from current events or from new markets under consideration, such as Boston, Denver, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Seattle or Washington, D.C.
There will also be a revamped post-season, introducing match play and a new TOUR Championship to be played on rotation at prestigious courses, several of them making their PGA Tour debuts.
Below that will be the PGA Tour Challenger Series, with at least 20 tournaments and minimum purses of US$4 million. It will be the primary springboard to reach the Championship Series. Its events will be played at recognised courses, many of them traditional PGA Tour venues, with around 144 players, 72 holes and a 36-hole cut for the top 65 and ties.
The key will be the promotion and relegation system. At minimum, the top 90 players in the Championship Series will retain full status for the following season. Those who do not will be able to drop to the Challenger Series. Conversely, at least 20 players from the Challenger Series will be promoted each year to the top category via the ranking.
There will also be two immediate promotion routes: winning multiple Challenger Series events in a single season or winning a Major.
The PGA Tour will also launch a sort of “last-chance” series in the autumn, with between four and six tournaments, through which some places for the following season’s Championship Series will be allocated. It will act as a second chance to improve or retain status.
Also in the autumn, and very importantly, international tournaments outside the United States have been announced in conjunction with the DP World Tour, and these will be national opens, such as the Open de Australia. We will see whether the Open de España can be included in this series of tournaments where the PGA Tour hopes to field the world’s best, that is, the players of the PGA Tour Championship Series.
Another important change will be the creation of new points systems, separate for each series and designed to be clearer and more intuitive for fans, television and the media. Points will only be accumulated within the relevant series.
Q-School will continue to exist as a route into the PGA Tour ecosystem, including the Challenger Series, the autumn last-chance series and development circuits such as the PGA Tour Américas.
“This model positions the PGA Tour for the future,” said Brian Rolapp, the circuit’s CEO. “Now our aim is to finalise all the details and prepare its implementation in 2028”. The calendar for 2028 is expected to be presented in the first quarter of 2028.
The reform represents a major change: less room for sponsor exemptions, greater sporting consequences each week, a more defined elite, a clearer pathway to move up and a real risk of losing one’s place. The PGA Tour 2028 already has a framework. And it comes with promotion and relegation.
It remains to be seen what will happen with the LIV players. It has not been ruled out that they may be offered a return via the Challengers. We will also see how this new PGA Tour affects the 10 cards that the DP World Tour used to award and whether it affects them in any way.
