Monty chalks up 600 Euro Tour starts
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Colin Montgomerie is celebrating his 600th European Tour start in Turkey today.
The 51-year-old Scot became only the seventh man to play in 600 European Tour events when he teed off in the £4.4million Turkish Airlines Open. Monty reached the landmark at the Montgomerie Maxx Royal in Antalya, a course he designed.
The eight-time European Order of Merit winner said: “It’s a fantastic milestone but it’s also an awfully long walk. Barry Lane worked out that in 600 tournaments you’d walk the whole way round the world and then on to Singapore. That’s an achievement in itself.”
Monty joins English trio Lane (684), Malcolm Mackenzie (605) and Roger Chapman (619), fellow Scot Sam Torrance (706), Miguel Angel Jimenez (641) of Spain and Irishman Eamonn Darcy (610) in reaching 600 competitive Tour outings.
He added: “It’s been some journey so far and I’m still enjoying it. If I had my time over again I don’t think I’d change too many things. To have represented the European Tour, which is fantastic and has become like an extended family, for this long is an honour.
“To reach the landmark on a course I designed and at one of the top events on the European Tour makes it even more special.”
Monty has won 31 times on the Tour and is the only player to win its flagship event, the BMW PGA Championship, three years in a row, from 1998-2000.
He is often ranked as one of the best players never to have lifted a Major, although he won the US PGA and the US Open on the Senior Tour this year.
