After a near month-long hiatus following the conclusion of the DP World Tour’s ‘Opening Swing,’ the European based tour now returns to kick-start the ‘International Swing’ with this week’s Dubai Desert Classic.
This week also serves as the first of five Rolex Series events of the season, offering an increased purse and more Race to Dubai points.
This event was first staged in 1989 and outside of the event not taking place in 1991, has been held every year since. This makes this year’s playing the 36th edition.
The Dubai Desert Classic takes place at the world-famous Majlis Course at the Emirates Golf Club. It has been held here every year outside of 1999 and 2000 where it was held at the Dubai Creek Resort.
The Field
As has become the tradition here in Dubai, we are in line for a star studded field to begin the 2025 calendar year.
Following last week’s Team Cup, which featured a group of 12 main-land Europeans versus 12 United Kingdom and Irish players, the Dubai Desert Classic serves as the first tournament of the calendar year.
Rory McIlroy continues his trek to become the greatest DP World Tour golfer of all time after claiming his sixth Order of Merit a season ago, tying him with Seve Ballesteros for most of all time.
McIlroy also comes in as the defending champion, holding off Adrian Meronk by a stroke a season ago to claim back-to-back Dubai Desert Classic titles and his fourth overall. This was also the sight of McIlroy’s first ever DP World Tour title back in 2009.
He’ll be joined by a slew of PGA Tour players, including Dubai resident Tommy Fleetwood. Viktor Hovland, the 2022 winner of this event, too will be teeing it up.
Other notable PGA Tour golfers in this week’s field include Robert MacIntyre, Akshay Bhatia and Nicoali Hojgaard.
Additionally, with the DP World Tour and the LIV Golf Tour coming to terms, six members of LIV will be teeing it up this week.
The most notable being Jon Rahm who will be joined by Meronk, Tyrrell Hatton, Dean Burmester, Patrick Reed and Thomas Pieters.
We’ll also see a collective of golfing legends teeing it up this week with names such as Adam Scott, Luke Donald and Padraig Harrington.
Other former champions of this event playing this week include McIlroy (2024, 2023, 2015 & 2009,) Hovland (2022,) Haotong Li (2018) and Rafa Cabrera-Bello (2012,)
The Course
The Majlis Course at the Emirates Golf Club will once again play host this week.
It plays as a par-72 at 7,428 yards.
The Majlis Course was designed by Karl Litten and opened in 1988.
Off-the-tee, there is little to no defense offered this week. This adds an emphasis to driving distance, as historically proven.
The fairways are fairly generous and the rough is non-penal.
Water is the course’s main line of defense as it comes into play on ten holes.
The greens were completely renovated three years ago, now featuring a Bermuda TifEagle grass that plays at roughly 11.5 on the Stimpmeter.
The front nine here at the Majlis Course plays much more difficult than the back nine. Four-of-the-five toughest holes on the course are featured on the front nine.
Two years ago, the front nine played to the tune of 35.18 (as a par-35) on average as the back nine played to an average of 35.6 as a par-37.
Of course, this track is an exposed desert track. Therefore, the wind has a lot to do with the way the course is played and managed.
If the wind picks up, the course dries out and scoring becomes much more difficult, just as we saw a week ago.
This was evident in 2020 when Lucas Herbert won at just -9 as the year prior, Bryson DeChambeau won at -24.
The Weather
As of the time of writing this, there is at most a ten-percent chance of precipitation on Saturday as the rest of the week calls for just a five-percent chance. Temperatures will range between 74-and-75 degrees across all four days as well. Winds will begin at nine miles-per-hour on Thursday before reaching 11 miles-per-hour on Friday and peaking at 12 miles-per-hour for both Saturday and Sunday. In all, a clear four days for some desert golf.
Key Stats
Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee (SG: OTT)
Average Driving Distance
Greens in Regulation Percentage (GIR%)
Strokes Gained: Putting (SG: PUTT)
Strokes Gained: Approach (SG: APP)
Betting Card
Viktor Hovland (+1400)
These types of events are hard to handicap. The top of the field is heavily favored and with both Rory McIlroy and Tommy Fleetwood playing this week, I want to keep my card light. With that being said, Hovland offers value at his current number. While dealing with a toe injury and walking the elevation changes that come with The Plantation Course at The Sentry Tournament of Champions, he didn’t look awful. Now, two weeks removed and playing some flat desert golf, I think he’s posed to compete with the best of them in Dubai. We’re getting Hovland at better odds than McIlroy, Jon Rahm, Tyrrell Hatton and Fleetwood. It’s been awhile since we’ve seen Hovland at his best but when he is, he can beat anyone. It was also reported that he recently started working with swing coach TJ Yeaton. We’ll see if that recent change can get Hovland firing on all cylinders in the desert.
Adrian Meronk (+8000)
If you’ve followed me the past three years, you had to assume I was going to go back to Meronk this week. He was the runner-up a season ago at this event to McIlroy. He finished the last season on LIV 15th in average driving distance, 25th in GIR% and 14th in putting average. We last saw the four-time DP World Tour winner at the DP World Tour Championship where he placed T30th. Meronk has been historically good at desert golf as well. In 2023 he placed T10th at the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship and T4th at the Ras Al Khaimah Championship. In 2022 he placed T4th at this event as well. He also placed T6th at the Ras Al Khaimah Classic and T3rd at the Commercial Bank Qatar Masters that year.
Scott Jamieson (+30000)
I had to take at least one long shot this week among a field of giants and that comes in the form of Scott Jamieson. Jamieson is currently fifth on Tour in GIR%, ninth in SG: APP, 12th in SG: OTT, 34th in SG: PUTT and 59th in average driving distance. He most recently placed T9th at the AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open. There is a direct correlation between desert golf and links style golf. Jamieson grew up playing links style golf in Scotland. During last season’s Desert swing (unofficial title) he placed T31st at the Hero Dubai Desert Classic, T16th at the Bahrain Championship and third at the Commercial Bank Qatar Masters.
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