Rory McIlroy won his eighth Race to Dubai title to tie the record of Scotland’s Colin Montgomerie after a dramatic final round of the season-ending $10 million DP World Tour Championship on Sunday.
The tournament itself was a runaway win for England’s Tyrrell Hatton (66) but all eyes were on the fascinating battle between McIlroy and Spain’s Eugenio Chacarra, playing a group behind.
It all came down to the 18th hole, where McIlroy made a disappointing par to finish on 10-under par, but that was good enough for a solo second place.
That took his ranking points to 5,044.86. Chacarra also could not get a birdie on the final hole and closed with a 69 for a tied third place at eight-under alongside Finland’s Oliver Lindell (65).
The European number one crown was secured with a bogey-free round of five-under par 67, but it all came down to the par-4 16th hole, where he hit a magnificent second shot to a foot for the decisive birdie.
The historic win was an emotional moment for McIlroy, a former UAE resident who started his golf journey in Dubai before going on to become of the greatest golfers of all time.
On Sunday, McIlroy started with a birdie, but the momentum seemed to have been halted over the next four holes, when he burnt the edge on three but could not get a second birdie.
He then picked up three shots over the next four holes, but Chacarra kept him in sight with four birdies in his first eight holes.
When McIlroy could not make a birdie on the par-5 14th hole, Chacarra was leading the projected ranking by a mere 0.1 point.
McIlroy dedicated his trophy to his father Gerry, who is recovering from a serious health crisis.
“He’s recovering well, thankfully,” McIlroy told the DP World Tour.
“But before I left to come here to the Middle East, I went up to Cleveland to see him. He said to me: ‘Go win The Race to Dubai’.
“This one’s for him.”
The six-time Major winner now wants to add more Race To Dubai trophy to his cabinet.
“Yeah, double digits,” he said.
“I’d love to surpass Monty next year and we’ll go from there.”
It was also a memorable day for Hatton who earned his sixth Rolex Series title with a dominant five shot victory.
Hatton’s final round at Jumeriah Golf Estates was relatively stress free, mixing one bogey with seven birdies on his way to a final round 66 around the Earth Course.
Despite missing the green with his approach to the par-five 18th, Hatton managed a chip and two putts to sign off an incredible end to the season finale with his ninth victory on the DP World Tour.
“This is really special,” Hatton said afterwards.
“I was really nervous today. I didn’t say anything to anyone in my team or even to Emily. Yeah, I’ve had a bit of heartbreak around here, and I felt like it was going to be a difficult day. Just really proud of how I played on the back nine. Putter was amazing. Certainly saved me all week. It feels so good to win here.”
Hatton, who held a one shot advantage over Victor Perez ahead of the final round, made a brilliant par-save from a wayward tee shot off the first and from there quickly extended his advantage with back-to-back birdies from the second.
He then recovered from a solitary bogey at the fourth with a continued display of brilliance with his irons, and while briefly caught at the top of the leaderboard by Mikael Lindberg, he began to pull away after adding a further birdie at the seventh to make the turn in 34.
The nine-time DP World Tour winner then found his groove over the closing nine, making birdies at 10, 12, 14 and 15 on his way to finishing with a comfortable gap around the Earth Course at Jumeriah Golf Estates.
“As I said, feeling weirdly nervous. So I tried not to look at leaderboards too much, and then just caught a glimpse of where I was at on 6, the par 3. And then I tried to not look at a leaderboard again until I think it was the par-514.
“So yeah I was just trying to keep my head down and try and make birdies. It felt like the conditions were marginally easy today because there was less wind but yeah some is of the greens were so fast, it was hard — I found it difficult at times to get the pace right but just glad it worked out in the end.”
He joins Lee Westwood (2009), Matt Fitzpatrick (2016, 2020, 2025) , and Danny Willett (2018) as the fourth Englishman to win this title.
The new season of the DP World Tour starts in two weeks in Australia with the BMW Australian PGA Championship.
Source: Khaleej Times