As Rory McIlroy celebrated his third European Tour Golfer of the Year award after winning the Race to Dubai title for the third time, the season-ending figures from Your Race to Dubai, The European Tour’s ground-breaking fan game powered by the live-scoring app Golf GameBook, revealed that it was the ‘Iceman’ Henrik Stenson who could lay claim to being the fans’ favourite.
INFOGRAPHIC
Since Your Race to Dubai launched at the BMW PGA Championship in May 2015, more than 200,000 rounds at 5,429 venues have been played against many of the world’s best golfers. Of the nearly 90 European Tour professionals available to challenge during the 2015 Your Race to Dubai season, it was the 2013 Race to Dubai champion, Stenson, who was chosen most frequently by golf fans as an opponent they wanted to compete against.
Commenting on his popularity in the game, the European Ryder Cup star said: “I’m very competitive by nature and I love match play, as I think you saw from The 2014 Ryder Cup at Gleneagles, so it’s exciting to be involved in another version of that through Your Race to Dubai.
“It’s great to think golfers can pick up a bag of clubs and an iPhone and play against me from anywhere in the world.” Henrik Stenson
Overall, the end of season figures from Your Race to Dubai highlight that golfers challenging European Tour pros won 29% of their matches, tied 9% and lost 62%, however, against Henrik the statistics were slightly more favourable for the fans, with the 2013 Race to Dubai champion winning 59% of his challenges and losing 32%.
Behind Stenson, Bernd Wiesberger, the 2015 Alstom Open de France champion, and Danny Willett, runner-up in the 2015 Race to Dubai were the second and third most challenged European Tour professionals throughout the 2015 Your Race to Dubai season.
Tim Hunt, Marketing Communications Director of The European Tour, said: “Throughout the debut season of Your Race to Dubai, golf fans have been able to experience direct competition with the stars they see on the television each week.
“This ground-breaking game has had a successful first year and continues to enable people around the world to engage with The European Tour tournaments in an innovative new way.”
The never-before-experienced fan game enables golfers to challenge European Tour professionals in a head-to-head match play every week. To take part, golfers simply use the Golf GameBook app to challenge a pro, play an 18-hole round of golf, enter their own scores and then watch as the match results update, hole-by-hole, live on the free iPhone app.
Scott Hamilton has been one of the most active Your Race to Dubai users this season and five of his 68 total challenges have been against Stenson. He said: “I once got a high-five from Henrik Stenson, and he’s a great golfer, so I always challenge him when I can.
“What I like most about Your Race to Dubai is that it’s completely new, it looks great and there’s nothing else like it. When the match is unfolding I become engrossed in the pro’s game and very interested in how they’re playing – it’s particularly pleasing when I win.”
In total, golfers playing Your Race to Dubai in 2015 have made 18.1 million strokes, 156 of which have been holes-in-one, while it is also estimated that users trying to emulate the European Tour stars have lost a staggering 402,000 golf balls. With roughly 7,000 challenges made each week, peaking at 10,721 during Made in Denmark, the total distance walked by all golfers taking part in Your Race to Dubai is 1.71 million kilometres, or one and a half times around the world...every week.
For further details about Your Race to Dubai visit:www.yourracetodubai.com
