Johannesburg — After a great start to his PGA Tour career in the US, with a fourth-place finish in the Sanderson Farms Championship in Mississippi, Dean Burmester said he will continue to support the DP World Tour.
Burmester closed his debut tournament on the PGA Tour with a five-under-par 65 to finish on 15-under-par, two strokes off the winning score and one shot behind countryman Garrick Higgo. And, while he acknowledged he has to devote a lot of his attention to keeping his status in the US, he also wants to honour his debt to the DP World Tour.
“I’m going to support the DP World Tour,” he said in comments after his final round. “They’ve been so good to me, so I’m going to try and plan a schedule next year as best I can, but I know that this re-rank coming into the RSM Classic in the middle of November is really important for my category, so this year I’ve got to prioritise the PGA Tour and play out here and do the best I can.
“Then I can reassess everything and get the family over and move over somewhere to Florida and see some friends I haven’t seen for a long time and go from there. We’ll probably, like I said, travel for a few tournaments and try and support the DP World Tour.”
Burmester has been announced as one of the players in the returning Nedbank Golf Challenge at Sun City from November 10-13. His travel plans for that will depend on just how he plays in his opening stint on the PGA Tour after such a good start.
“I’ve got the Shriners Children’s Open in Las Vegas next week,” he said. “I’m not in the ZOZO Championship or the CJ Cup after that, so it’ll be probably two weeks off for me, and it’s my son’s first birthday, as well, so it kind of fits in pretty well, and then I’ll be back in the US for the next four, I think. Depending on if I play really well, I might go back to the Nedbank Golf Challenge back home in South Africa instead of the RSM Classic here that week. I’m in that, so I should go back and support that if I keep this kind of form up.”
And with a strategic alliance between the PGA Tour and the DP World Tour taking on more significance in the face of the presence of LIV Golf, his desire to play on both circuits makes a lot of sense. “Everything has kind of panned out,” he said, “and the timing couldn’t be better with the relationship of the PGA Tour and the DP World Tour. It gives me a little bit of freedom, and I can just go out there and free-wheel it and play the best I can.”
His form seems exactly what so many expected from him as he gets going on a tour to which he seems ideally suited. “It was good,” he said of his fourth-place finish. “I had some interesting times out there for sure. I don't play on Bermuda grass very often, like I’ve said before, and it was just good to get four rounds under par and play some consistent golf. It feels like I’ve been playing well for a while, and I’m in a good kind of head space, and I’m looking forward to the full season and trying to do what I can do out here.
“I’m like pretty much everybody else my age and younger; everyone grew up watching Tiger (Woods) winning amazing historic events on the PGA Tour, and I want to come out here and try and put my name next to his on some of those trophies. It’s pretty simple.”
With just one tournament under his belt, it’s too early to judge how he will do over a season, but he lies ninth on the early FedEx Cup standings. It’s a good place to start.
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