Special Features
Omega Dubai Desert Classic 2013
The Omega Dubai Desert Classic was born in 1989 when the European Tour visited Asia for the first time. It was the 38th event on the European Tour. The roll of honour includes six different Major Champions. They are: Seve Ballesteros (1992), Ernie Els (1994, 02, 05), Fred Couples (1995), José Maria Olazábal (1998), Mark O’Meara (2004) and Tiger Woods (2006, 08). Between them they have won 27 Major Championships.•Tiger Woods, who has featured in the $2.5 million event six times since 2001, is the only player after Els to record multiple victories in Dubai. Els has played 12 times in the Omega Dubai Desert Classic over Emirates Golf Club’s Majlis course. In that time he has recorded three victories, nine top threes and never finished lower than eighth.
•Of his 46 rounds on the Majlis course he has a total of 169 under par. Els, who missed the cut for the first time in 2009, set the current course record of 61 (-11) on the opening day in 1994, which contained a European Tour record of 12 birdies in a single round. He has broken par in 41 of his 46 rounds. In 2009, he, for the first time, signed on an over par score of 73.
•Since making his first visit to Dubai in 2001, Woods has won the $2.5 million European Tour event twice and finishing no worse than a tied 20th. He is a whopping 86-under-par for the 24 rounds that he has played at the Majlis course --an average of 14.33 under par per tournament.
•Northern Ireland teenager Rory McIlroy, at 19 years and 273 days, became the youngest winner of the Dubai Desert Classic 2009, beating the previous best of England’s David Howell, who had won the 1999 edition when he was 23 and 236 days old. The youngest player ever to win a European Tour event is Italy’s Matteo Manassero who captured the Castello Masters Costa Azahar in October 2010 at 17 years and 188 days, smashing the record held by Danny Lee, who was 18 years and 213 days old when he won the 2008 Johnnie Walker Classic.
•The 2011 edition also witnessed a hole-in-hole in every round. It was only the second time in the history of the European Tour that such a feat was recorded. The first occasion was the 1991 Mediterranean Open. David Howell of England, Keith Horne of South Africa, France’s Raphael Jacquelin and 2011 champion Alvaro Quiros of Spain aced the seventh, fourth, seventh and 11th in that order.
•The 2012 winner Rafael Cabrera-Bello represented the first time a Spaniard has won the same European Tour event for three consecutive years since the Mallorca Classic, when Miguel Angel Jimenez won in 2003, Sergio Garcia in 2004 and Jose Maria Olazabal in 2005. With this win, Cabrera-Bello also became the fifth Spanish player to win the Omega Dubai Desert Classic, following Seve Ballesteroes (1992), Olazabal (1998), Jimenez (2010) and Alvaro Quiros (2011).
England’s Barry Lane is the only player to have played in all 23 editions of the event, having played in the inaugural one in March 1989, and he has set his sights firmly on reaching the milestone of 25 at a venue he describes as “five star in every respect”.
Omega Dubai Desert Classic 2013 starts on 31 Jan 2013 at the Emirates Golf Club.
