It”s no secret that we”re in the midst of economic hard times. When families have to make ends meet, they cut back on non-essentials such as vacations, eating out, entertainment and golf. Businesses have had to make similar cutbacks and one of the areas that has been impacted by the economic crisis is sponsorship of professional golf tournaments.
While it”s the best of times, relatively speaking, for the European Tour, and the status of the American PGA Tour is that it”s basically holding serve, such is not the case for other major golf tours. The LPGA Tour, the PGA Champions Tour, and the Nationwide Tour have had to cut back on their schedules because of a lack of corporate sponsorship money.
The European Tour has not only grown by leaps and bounds during the past 20 years it also has been able to think outside the box to attract corporate interests in faraway places such as Dubai and China. In fact, to be quite honest, the European Tour is the closest thing there is to a world golf circuit with 50 tournaments contested during a 52-week period of time. Nowadays, the European Tour commences its tourney calendar in mid-December with events in South Africa and will conclude in early December of 2011 with its version of a tour championship in Dubai. Yes, South Africa and Dubai are far removed from the European continent, and yet if you”re a professional golfer who wants to see the world, then the European Tour is the place to be.
After spending December and January in South Africa, the European Tour hosts four events in the Persian Gulf and one in India. The month of March has Mediterranean Sea stops in Italy, Spain and Morocco, and then it”s off to Malaysia, China and Korea. In May, the European Tour visits Spain and Portugal. From that point on it spends the summer months all the way through October teeing it up in 25 tournaments in 14 European countries, everywhere from the birthplace of golf in Scotland to the Czech Republic. The Euros spend November in the Far East and conclude the year with the big-money Dubai World Championship.
European Tour sponsors include old standbys such as Volvo, KLM, BMW, Johnnie Walker, Barclays and Omega. There are also newer sponsors such as HSBC, the advertising sponsor of the World Golf Championship in Shanghai, and DP World, the presenter of the Dubai World Championship. To its credit, the European Tour is the home circuit of world No. 1 Lee Westwood as well as three major champions from 2010, namely Graeme McDowell, Louis Oostheuzen and Martin Kaymer. In a nutshell, the European Tour has a vast number of tournaments, a wide-ranging fan base, corporate support, and some of golf”s biggest names.
The American PGA Tour kicks off its 2011 season this week in Hawaii with the playing of the limited-field Tournament of Champions at Kapalua. The following week, the tour will visit Waialae for its first full-field event. After that, it”s seven weeks in California and Arizona, visiting venues of historic note, including Pebble Beach, Riviera Country Club and Torrey Pines, all past U.S. Open sites.
The PGA Tour”s schedule is traditional and has followed a similar format for decades. After the West Coast swing, the tour goes to Florida for four weeks, Texas for four weeks, makes a Southern swing through places such as Harbor Town and New Orleans, and then goes on its usual summer campaign throughout the Midwest and the Eastern seaboard. The only variation over the past five years is the Fed Ex Cup series in September followed by the Fall Finish. This year the PGA Tour hosts 45 events and has many of its usual sponsors, including Sony, AT&T, Barcalys, BMW and Coca Cola.
Basically, professional golfers can play every week in a PGA Tour or a European Tour event. Such is not the case for the major women”s circuit, the LPGA Tour, and the circuit for the over-50 set, the PGA Champions Tour.
The Senior Tour starts out its season in Hawaii in January and then goes to Florida in February, but during those eight weeks just four tournaments are held. The trend continues into March, April and May when another six tourneys are played during a three-month period of time. During those months, the seniors go to California, Florida and the South. In June, July and August there are three tournaments each month, and the most difficult of travel situations is with the playing of the Senior British Open at Walton Heath in London from July 21-24 followed by the United States Senior Open at Inverness in Toledo from July 28-31. Now that”s some tough tournament traveling.
The senior set plays twice in September, twice in October, travels from Korea to North Carolina to Texas, and then concludes its season in early November at Harding Park in San Francisco. All in all, there are just 24 events during 40 weeks on the Champions Tour.
The story is the same for the LPGA Tour. They too have 24 tournaments running from early February in Thailand to the LPGA Tour Championship in early December. The women”s game has more support overseas than it does in the United States as evidenced by tourney sites in Thailand, Singapore, Mexico, France, England, China, Canada, South Korea, Malaysia, Taiwan and Japan. A total of 12 LPGA Events are played beyond American soil and the nature of the schedule is baffling as the tour jumps from summer events in Colorado to France to Scotland to China to Oregon to Canada to Arkansas. Looks like the stars of the LPGA Tour put themselves in a position to get lots of frequent flier miles.
The gaps in the LPGA schedule are glaring with just one tourney scheduled for May and September while there are four events in October. For a struggling professional trying to make it, this has to be hard on the body and on the golf game. And yet it”s a sign of the times. Another sign of the times is that the LPGA won”t be returning to the Bay Area for the CVS Charity Classic, another victim of the struggling economy.
A new year of professional golf is upon us, and yet the landscape of golf”s major tours is littered with fewer tournaments as well as unbalanced schedules featuring tough travel.
