This week heralds  the start of a new and final chapter in the 2012 Race to Dubai schedule.

After some seven months of tournaments throughout the length and breadth of the European continent, the European Tour has headed east for the remaining events of the season starting with the ISPS Handa Perth International in Western Australia.

The inaugural event is the first of some six tournaments leading to the season-ending DP World Tour Championship in Dubai starting on November 22nd.

The European Tour’s Keith Waters determined to provide a successful playing environment for Tour members.

So while the hype of PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup Series has long been parcelled up and put to bed for another 12 months, the European Tour continues to offer competition for all its members.

www.golfbytourmiss.com recently spoke with Keith Waters, Chief Operating Officer and Director of International Polcy with the Tour on the concerns and issues facing the Tour at this time of the season.

“The challenge for all of us is to get our players to play more often and fortunately at this time it is easier,” said Waters.

“They are international players and they want to play in different countries and not just purely in the States.  Also they have sponsors and endorsements, and they are encouraged by the companies they represent to play more around the world.

“So if we create the right environment via the tournaments, the travel and the hotels then we can be successful.

“You might not challenge the FedEx but you can be successful.

“Our model of play in countries is currently strong apart from the up and downs in countries like Spain but if you look at where the European Tour came from it was the national open’s run by the various federations and whether it was the Italian Open or the French Open there were individuals within those Federations who wanted their national open to continue and to succeed.

“So when you have very powerful people working on their one event a year the model is very strong.

“You can be assured the Spanish Golf Federation, despite what is going on with the economy in Spain, is determined for their tournament to go ahead, and we saw that this year with the Centenary of the Spanish Open.

“So the European Tour is in a very good position going forward.”

There was the exciting announcement last week in Antalya that a Turkish Open will be added to the Race to Dubai schedule for the next three years, and that the $US 7m event will be the penultimate event on the Race to Dubai Schedule.

However the problem that arises is that the co-sanctioned Singapore Open and Hong Open titles for next year will be staged after the Race to Dubai, as as such, the two events will form part of the 2014 Race to Dubai schedule.

As well, Waters revealed the Tournament Players Committee has been discussing reducing by five the automatic qualification in retaining Tour membership to the top-110 players.

Waters explained:  “The Players Committee discussed it at their meeting in St. Andrews and it’s all about opportunities for Challenge Tour players and the Q School guys as we can’t make it too difficult for the newer players to compete on the main Tour.

“It used to top 125 and one of the problems we have, and because we have so many tournaments and so many winners, we have winners filling Categories 1, 2 and 3 because those categories are for winners.

“The categories cover from some 30 to 70 players and that then reduces the opportunities for the players coming from the Q School and Challenge Tour.

“There is further work on that and we are going to initiate any changes we have to do that before the end of the season so it will come into effect before the first event of 2013 in Durban in December.”

Our thanks as always to Keith Waters in providing this insight into Tour interests and initiatives.