The European Swing takes us to Tuscany this week for the Italian Open as players battle for DP World Tour victory and spots at The Open Championship. Here are your five things to know.
Siem defends
Marcel Siem enjoyed one of his career highlights as he made a final-hole birdie in regulation play and then overcame Tom McKibbin in a play-off to win last year’s Italian Open. In one of ten events last season to go to extra holes, the German had to dig deep and use all his experience to win his sixth DP World Tour title at Adriatic Golf Club Cervia. After victory at the Hero Indian Open a year earlier, it was his second triumph on Golf’s Global Tour in as many seasons. In between the two, the charismatic German faced adversity – like at other stages in his career – as a hip injury sidelined him for three months earlier in the 2024 Race to Dubai campaign. "I love this sport and these moments, I work really hard for them,” he said. “When you get rewarded like this, it’s a very special moment.”
A new setting
The 82nd edition of the Italian Open takes place in Tuscany for just the second time, 42 years on from German Bernhard Langer’s victory at the Golf Club Ugolino in Florence in 1983. This week, the historic national Open takes place at Argentario Golf Club. Designed by Davis Mezzacane and Baldovino Dassù in 2006, the layout of the holes was subsequently shaped by Brian Jorgensen. The 6,857-yard par-71 course is set amid the Mediterranean vegetation in a protected natural area and has holes that overlook the sea and the Orbetello Lagoon. It is the second European Tour group event to be staged at the course in back-to-back years, after the venue hosted the Italian Challenge Open on the HotelPlanner Tour last season. In honour of Franco Chimenti, former President of the Italian Golf Federation, the best finisher among players born or after January 1, 2000, who make the cut, will be awarded the Memorial Franco Chimenti.
To learn more about the Memorial Franco Chimenti, click here.
Inside the field
Of the 23 events to be staged so far this season, 13 of the winners are teeing it up this week - nine of whom are first-time winners. In Connor Syme, Nicolai von Dellingshausen, Kristoffer Reitan, Martin Couvra and Marco Penge, each of the last five winners – outside the Major Championships – are in action. Four-time DP World Tour winner Guido Migliozzi is the top-ranked Italian in the world in the field, and he is joined by a host of countrymen including Edoardo Molinari, Andrea Pavan – who both also competed at the U.S. Open earlier this month - and Renato Paratore. The latter is the current Road to Mallorca Number One on the HotelPlanner Tour after two victories so far this season. England’s John Parry, who won earlier this season in Mauritius on his comeback to the DP World Tour, returns to a venue where he secured automatic promotion from the HotelPlanner Tour last season as a three-time winner.
Back in the Swing of things
After an off-week on the DP World Tour – the last until after next month’s Open Championship – the European Swing picks back up in Italy. Through the opening four counting events of the penultimate Global Swing on the 2025 Race to Dubai schedule, four first-time winners have emerged. One of those, Reitan, leads the standings after winning at the Soudal Open and then finishing second at the Austrian Alpine Open presented by SalzburgerLand. But with this and next week’s BMW International Open in Germany still to come, and nine of the top ten on the Swing standings in action, there is opportunity for those behind to close the gap or in some cases overtake the Norwegian. The winner of the Swing will earn entry into every event in Phase Two of the Race to Dubai - the Back 9 - along with a US$200,000 bonus, while there is also an exemption into the Genesis Scottish Open at play.
Spots at The Open up for grabs
For the second season in a row, the Italian Open – a mainstay of the DP World Tour since its inception in 1972 – features as part of the Qualifying Series for The Open at Royal Portrush this summer. As with last year, there are two places available to the top two players not already exempt who make the cut. It is one of the last chances for players to seal a place in the final Major Championship of the season, with McKibbin and Sean Crocker benefitting from the route 12 months ago. The Qualifying Series will feature one more time on the DP World Tour at next month’s Genesis Scottish Open, a Rolex Series event co-sanctioned with the PGA TOUR. Ryggs Johnston, Dylan Naidoo, Penge and Darren Fichardt have all secured their spots in Northern Ireland through the Qualifying Series. Of those in action this week, Jordan Smith, Migliozzi, Elvis Smylie, John Catlin and South African amateur Bryan Newman are also already exempt.
