Google News
For the first time since he was relieved of his role as captain of the Europe team at the 2023 Ryder Cup in Rome, for accepting flattery from LIV Golf (the Arab Super League), Henrik Stenson is preparing to return to play in a DP tournament World Tour.
Henrik Stenson, schedule
From 19 to 22 January, the Swede will be among the protagonists of the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship, an event of the Rolex Series. In the United Arab Emirates on the field there will be, among others, also the Englishman Luke Donald who has replaced Stenson at the helm of the Europe team.
After a successful amateur career - culminating in playing for his country in the 1998 Eisenhower Trophy in Chile - Stenson turned professional in late 1998 and won the Challenge Tour money list the very next season, 1999/2000.
This brought him to the European Tour in 2001, where he has so far won six tournaments and placed at the top of several top events. In 2005, Stenson was eighth on the European Tour Order of Merit (money list), improving to sixth in 2006, fourth in 2007, and ranked in the top 20 in the world golf rankings.
After winning the Players Championship in May 2009, Stenson achieved his best placing in the world rankings with rank 5. In 2005 he was called up for the first time in the European team at the Seve Trophy and was team best.
In 2006 he won the Royal Trophy for Team Europe against the best golfers in Asia and was also part of the winning team in Europe in the Ryder Cup. In November 2008 he won the World Cup for Sweden with Robert Karlsson. After these successes, Henrik Stenson went through a deep sporting crisis, during which he temporarily slipped out of the top 200 in the world rankings.
It wasn't until 2012 that he returned with his next tournament victory (European Tour - the South African Open). A new career highlight came in 2013 when, in addition to some top placements (including second place at the British Open), he won two of the well-rewarded playoff tournaments of the FedEx Cup and at the same time secured the overall victory with prize money of US$ 10 million .
He then also won the European Tour's Race to Dubai, becoming the first golfer in history to win both of these most important annual rankings in the same season. In the world rankings, Stenson improved to third place. He achieved the greatest success of his career by winning The Open Championship in 2016.
He is the first male golfer from Sweden to win a major and set a new Open record with a total of 264 shots. Stenson also broke the single-round record for a major with his final round of 63 shots. At the end of the 2016 season, he again won the European Tour's Race to Dubai.