Cold figures are sometimes unfair with reality, but the presence of 13 golfers in the OWGR top 100 and 12 Ryder Cup players serve to reckon the magnitude of the ninth edition of the Estrella Damm N.A. Andalucía Masters, tournament to be held from October 19-22 at the Real Club de Golf Sotogrande.
All of them will fight for the title in the regular tournament with the best prize fund of all those held on Spanish soil in DP World Tour's history. The Estrella Damm N.A. Andalucía Masters strong field will be led by Wyndham Clark, 2023 U. S. Open champion, Ryan Fox, 2023 BMW PGA Championship winner or Matt Kuchar, four-time U.S. Ryder Cup team member. They will be joined by stars of the stature of Robert MacIntyre, two-time DP World Tour winner and one of the European stars at the Ryder Cup in Rome, where he finished undefeated and scored 2.5 points in three matches.
In his spectacular debut in the biannual competition he was mentored by three vice-captains that will play in Sotogrande: the brothers Francesco and Edoardo Molinari, inescapable reference of Italian, European and world golf, and Thomas Bjørn, bastion of continental golf and captain of the winning team in the 2018 Ryder Cup in Paris. Francesco, 2018 Open Championship winner, returns to Spain to play his third Estrella Damm N.A. Andalucía Masters, while Edoardo has never missed his appointment in this event and will play it for the ninth time. Thomas Bjørn will sign his seventh appearance.
The Danes Thorbjørn Olesen and Søren Kjeldsen, who came close to winning the first edition of the Estrella Damm N.A. Andalucía Masters in 2010; the Englishmen Oliver Wilson, Ross Fisher and Andy Sullivan; and the Welshman Jamie Donaldson also left their brilliant mark in different editions of the Ryder Cup.
The international squad is reinforced by Poland's Adrian Meronk, with three brilliant victories on the DP World Tour in the last fifteen months and firmly established in the noble zone of the world ranking; France's Victor Perez, already with five DP World Tour titles to his credit; or Sweden's Alexander Björk, a prodigy of consistency who already has eight top-tens in 2023.
Rasmus Højgaard, Thriston Lawrence, Dale Whitnell, Tom McKibbin, Simon Forsström, Marcel Siem, Jordan Smith, Guido Migliozzi, Richie Ramsay, Ewen Ferguson and Todd Clements are other recent winners on the DP World Tour that will be at the Real Club de Golf Sotogrande and will have to face the local team led, among others, by Adrian Otaegui, defending champion, Pablo Larrazabal, winner of two tournaments in 2023, Jorge Campillo, with a title already this season, or Rafa Cabrera Bello, 2021 Open de España champion.
Enjoying live all these players at the Real Club de Golf Sotogrande is quite easy, since you only need to purchase tickets for Estrella Damm N.A. Andalucía Masters, with special prices for federated golfers and free for children under 13, on the event website.
The Estrella Damm N.A. Andalucía Masters, an event in the DP World Tour’s Race to Dubai made possible by the essential contribution of the Real Club de Golf Sotogrande, is sponsored by Estrella Damm and the Consejería de Turismo, Cultura y Deporte de la Junta de Andalucía, jointly funded by the EU and was declared Event of Exceptional Public Interest by the Government of Spain.
