Whilst the European Challenge Tour has garnered a reputation for unearthing the golfing superstars of the future – witness Germany’s Martin Kaymer in 2006, and more recently Wales’ Rhys Davies – it has also provided an opportunity to rebuild careers for players who have lost their way.
The most recent and perhaps most dramatic example of the latter is Italy’s Edoardo Molinari who, after a season of struggle in 2008 on The European Tour, reinvented himself in phenomenal fashion last year with a record-breaking season on the Challenge Tour.
Molinari is undoubtedly a better player now than he was two years ago – the winter work he underwent with swing coach and Golf Night analyst Denis Pugh in 2008 has dramatically improved his all-round game – but the confidence he gained from winning three titles and earning €242,980 last term has also unarguably contributed towards the scintillating start he has made to this season.
The 29 year old currently lies in 24th place in The Race to Dubai with €241,210 – which is already over €100,000 more than he earned in the whole of the 2008 season – thanks largely to his tied fourth finishes at the South African Open Championship and the Omega Dubai Desert Classic.
Then last week, on only his second appearance on the US PGA Tour, he finished in a tie for second place behind winner Ernie Els at the Arnold Palmer Invitational.
Whilst the 2010 Challenge Tour season is just two events old, England’s Robert Dinwiddie has emerged as an early contender to follow Molinari’s lead.
Having started his second Challenge Tour campaign in sound fashion with a tied fifth finish at the season-opening event in Colombia, Dinwiddie captured his third title when he saw off all-comers – including his compatriot Oliver Fisher – at last week’s Kenya Open.
His cheque for €30,400 catapulted Dinwiddie to the top of the Rankings on €38,411, and he seems much more content with life on the Challenge Tour, where he has won twice before.
That was in 2007, when he finished eighth in the Rankings with earnings of €91,257. The next season, his first foray on The European Tour, Dinwiddie won almost five times as much en route to 72nd place on the money list.
It seemed his career was about to take off, and that view hardened when he finished in a tie for eighth place at the 2009 season-opening Alfred Dunhill Championship. But it proved to be a false dawn – it would be Dinwiddie’s highest finish of the year.
Five consecutive missed cuts in the middle of the season knocked his confidence, and even before he had missed the cut at the season-ending UBS Hong Kong Open – where he needed a top ten finish to stand any chance of keeping his European Tour card – the writing was already on the wall.
But instead of feeling despondent Dinwiddie vowed to work harder than ever on his game over the long winter months, and the fruits of that labour can be seen in his fine form.
Away from the spotlight and in a more relaxed environment, Dinwiddie is thriving – and, perhaps more importantly, he is playing with a smile on his face again.
Dinwiddie said: “I had a really enjoyable week in Kenya, and it’s been a great start to the season for me. Winning so early in the year took a bit of pressure off and also gave me a lot of confidence, so hopefully I can relax a bit more and enjoy the rest of the season. My form’s been pretty good so far, and if I can keep playing the way I am through the rest of the year, I’ll be very happy.
“My putting will probably be the key this season, because that’s mainly where I struggled last year. I recently changed my putter and it seems to have done the trick, so I’m feeling much more confident about my stroke now than I was last year. My game didn’t feel a million miles away last season, which made it all the more frustrating that I lost my card. Towards the end of the season I felt under pressure to make cuts and try to climb the rankings, and I think it showed.
“But I’m feeling more relaxed and in control now, and I think that’s shown in my results. I’ve now won three times on the Challenge Tour before, and if I can get another one under my belt between now and the end of the season, hopefully it’ll be enough to get my card back for the main Tour.”
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