Wednesday, October 07, 2009


October 5, 2008 and October 5, 2009:


two red-letter days for Richie Ramsay


FROM THE EUROPEAN TOUR WEBSITE

If they needed any more motivation as the Challenge Tour season draws to a close, the field gathered for this week’s ALLIANZ Golf Open Grand Toulouse need look no further than the inspirational recent performances of last year’s champion, Richie Ramsay, pictured right.
October 5 – the date last year when he captured his second Challenge Tour title, following his victory at the Vodafone Challenge two months previously – has been something of a red letter date in the Scot’s fledgling professional career. Ramsay’s two-shot triumph at Golf de Toulouse-Seilh, which will host the seventh edition of the event this week, took his season’s winnings past the €100,000 mark and earned him a place on The European Tour for the first time.
Exactly 12 months later, on Monday October 5, 2009, Ramsay guaranteed a second season on the top tier after the €149,810 he collected for his tied fourth finish at the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship moved him inside the top 100 in The Race to Dubai, with just seven events to play before the season-ending Dubai World Championship presented by: DP World.
Indeed, were it not for a bogey at St Andrews’ famous closing hole, where three-putted from the ‘Valley of Sin’ (after driving on to the tarmac road that bisects the 18th fairway), Ramsay would even have joined Northern Ireland’s Rory McIlroy and England’s Oliver Wilson in a tie for second place.
But the 26 year old Aberdonian, who won the US Amateur Championship in 2006, was just delighted to have retained his playing privileges after a slow start to his maiden European Tour campaign.
He said: “The goal at the start of the week was to try to win the tournament, or at least finish in the top ten because I knew that would secure my card. There’s no better place to do it than at St Andrews. This is my first year on the Tour and it’s a tough gig, so I’m just delighted to get there. "It’s a massive weight off my shoulders. I’m confident that if I play to my potential, as I did last week, I can be up towards the top of the leaderboard regularly. I feel this could be just the start of things for me. I’m looking to be up there and competing for titles now.
“To play so well on home soil, in front of so many supporters, was great. I think I responded well to the challenge, physically and mentally, in a great field. If you look at the top of the leaderboard, you’re not going to get much stronger than that. I played with Rory McIllory numerous times as an amateur and I have looked up to players such as Luke Donald, so it was great to see my name up there among them.”
Coincidentally, the man who finished alongside Ramsay on 16 under par was Spain’s Rafael Cabrera-Bello, who also graduated from the Challenge Tour last season, thanks largely to his victory at the Credit Suisse Challenge.
The Spaniard was recently named The Race to Dubai European Tour Golfer of the Month for September after his stunning triumph at the Austrian Golf Open, which saw him become the fourth member of the Challenge Tour class of 2008 to win on The 2009 European Tour International Schedule.
As it stands, eight Challenge Tour graduates are in the top 115 of The Race to Dubai, and therefore on course to keep their European Tour playing privileges:
Cabrera-Bello (32nd)
Northern Ireland’s Gareth Maybin (55th)
The Celtic Manor Wales Open champion Jeppe Huldahl of Denmark (59th)
Last season’s No 1 David Horsey of England (71st)
Ramsay (96th)
The Madeira Islands Open BPI – Portugal winner Tano Goya of Argentina (101st)
The English duo of Gary Lockerbie and Richard Bland (respectively 109th and 110th).
In addition, England’s Seve Benson would only need to improve three places in order to climb into the all-important top 115, while Sweden’s Christian Nilsson is also exempt on The European Tour next season after his victory at the dual-ranking SAINT-OMER OPEN presented by Neuflize OBC.

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