The Regnum Carya Resort in southern Antalya plays host to the Turkish Airlines Open for the second consecutive year as The Race to Dubai nears it’s conclusion. Thorbjorn Olesen will try and defend the title he won wire-to-wire twelve months ago, winning by six shots at an impressive 20 under par.
The 7,200 yard, par 71 layout at Regnum Carya presents a tree-lined, lush, tactical challenge to the players. Fairways and greens are relatively easy to hit but the fast, sloping greens can cause headaches. The course ranked as the second easiest on Tour last year in terms of bogeys, yielding an average of just 2.33 per player per round.
With that in mind, here’s who our statistics guru has tipped for success this week.
Pick of the favourites: Henrik Stenson
Off the back of a runner-up finish at the WGC-HSBC Champions, Henrik Stenson appears to be in his usual end-of-season form arriving in Turkey. The Swede has seven top ten finishes worldwide this season but is yet to win on the European Tour in 2017. In terms of this event, Stenson has the best career scoring average (68.0) and has beaten the field average by 2.5 shots per round in his eight career rounds. He has never finished worse than seventh in Turkey and on a course that suits accurate ball strikers, expect to see ‘The Iceman’ in contention over the weekend.
Form horse: Victor Dubuisson
It’s hard to find fault in Victor Dubuisson’s Turkish Airlines Open record. In his four starts at this event, the Frenchman has two wins and one other top 15 finish. He is 58 under par for his 16 rounds in Turkey and trails only Stenson in terms of score vs field average at 2.4 shots per round. Whilst his form this year hasn’t been the same that saw him qualify for the 2014 European Ryder Cup team, the 27 year old did notch a a top three at the Dunhill Links in his last finish on Tour three weeks ago and will be as eager as anyone to return to this tournament.
Wildcard: David Lipsky
America’s David Lipsky has finished in the top 20 at the Turkish Airlines Open in each of his three appearances and was in contention on this course twelve months ago. With a tournament scoring average of 69.08 he clearly enjoys the courses in the area. His 2017 season maybe hasn’t lived up to his expectations but his three top five finishes have all come on similar style courses at Shenzhen, Malaysia and Hong Kong. Not many will have Lipsky in their Fantasy teams this week, so there should be good value in having him on your team.
Those are our three picks, now it's time to make yours.Pick your seven-man Daily Fantasy teamfor each round of this week's event and play in either free or money games.
