Bahrain Championship Preview 2025

IMPORTANT NOTE: Due to unforeseen circumstances, Paul won’t be producing a full preview and selections this week for the Bahrain Championship. Apologies for any inconvenience, normal service will be resumed ASAP.

Paul’s pre-event preview/notes on the event are available below for your reference.

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Course Overview: Royal Golf Club is a 7,302 yard par 72 desert course that some of you may vaguely recall from the 2011 Volvo Golf Champions held here, which was won by Paul Casey.

A Colin Montgomerie design that was constructed in 2008, a renovation ahead of last year’s inaugural event saw bunkers and greens rebuilt to adhere to current DP World Tour specification with the objective of improving the scope for fair pin positions and creating bigger, flatter putting surfaces.

The course itself is an exposed, desert affair with reasonably generous fairways leading to firm, well-bunkered greens. Water is in play towards the end of the round and although Paul Casey got to 20-under back in 2011, the general consensus is that this course would present a fairly stiff challenge whenever there’s a fairly stiff breeze blowing across it, as was evident with a 13-under total at last year’s event.

As part of the renovation, the Paspalum grass was removed from putting surfaces and kept alive while the work was undertaken, then replaced afterwards, so it could remain in great condition for last year’s curtain-raiser. Flatter greens allow the course superintendent to increase stimp speeds, so I’m expecting fairly firm, fast surfaces once again this week.

An even 36/36 split with two par-5s on each half, the stretch from 9 through to 14 is likely to be the most scoreable with 3 of the par-5s, 2 short par-4s, and the track’s shortest par-3 featured in those 6 holes.

Tournament Stats. We’ve published some key player statistics for this week’s Bahrain Championship that will help to shape a view on players who may play well at this event.

As noted above, this is only the second renewal of this event with some very patchy stats available from various other tournaments held here, so course history needs to be considered accordingly: Current Form | Course Form | First Round Leader Stats | Combined Form/Course Stats.

Predictor Model. Our published Predictor Model is available here. As always you can build your own model using the variables available.

Course Winners: 2024: Dylan Frittelli -13 (175/1), 2020: MENA Tour, David Hague (207 strokes, 3 rounds); 2019: MENA Tour, Robin Roussel (204 strokes, 3 rounds); 2011: Volvo Golf Champions (European Tour) Paul Casey (268 strokes, 4 rounds).

Weather Forecast. The latest weather forecast for Bahrain is here.

The main feature this week is likely to be a fairly stiff north-westerly wind blowing across the region which will introduce cloudy conditions and keep the temperature down to around 70 Fahrenheit, give or take.

A fairly consistent 15-20mph wind with gusts in excess of that at times will keep a lid on scoring, much as it did last year when -13 proved to be enough for Dylan Frittelli.

Tournament Trends & Key Factors. We have traditional stats for the top 5 finishers last year as follows:

• 1st: Dylan Frittelli (-13); 327 yards (3rd), 41.1% fairways (47th), 79.2% greens in regulation (4th), 73.3% scrambling (7th), 1.82 putts per GIR (39th)
• 2nd: Zander Lombard (-11); 310 yards (12th), 41.1% fairways (47th), 76.4% greens in regulation (8th), 52.9% scrambling (53rd), 1.71 putts per GIR (7th)
• 2nd: Jesper Svensson (-11); 323 yards (4th), 42.9% fairways (40th), 75% greens in regulation (10th), 77.8% scrambling (3rd), 1.80 putts per GIR (32nd)
• 4th: Frederic Lacroix (-9); 308 yards (16th), 48.2% fairways (21st), 75% greens in regulation (10th), 55.6% scrambling (46th), 1.78 putts per GIR (21st)
• 4th: Ockie Strydom (-9); 310 yards (11th), 41.1% fairways (47th), 72.2% greens in regulation (22nd), 65% scrambling (18th), 1.75 putts per GIR (11th)

The formula for the top 5 finishers was fairly consistent 12 months ago with all 5 ranking inside the top 16 on the week for Driving Distance whilst each finding less than 50% of fairways. Aside from length off the tee, GIR was the other common factor with three-quarters of putting surfaces found in regulation, give or take.

The only other tangible data we have comes from the 2011 Volvo Golf Champions won by Paul Casey:

• 1^st: Paul Casey (-20); 303 yards (5th), 66.7% fairways (25th), 74.1% greens in regulation (52nd), 71.4% scrambling (17th), 1.65 putts per GIR (6th)
• 2^nd: Peter Hanson (-19); 292 yards (28th), 73.2% fairways (15th), 80.6% greens in regulation (17th), 78.6% scrambling (8th), 1.67 putts per GIR (8th)
• 2^nd: Miguel Angel Jimenez (-19); 285 yards (48th), 76.8% fairways (7th), 87.5% greens in regulation (1st), 88.9% scrambling (3rd), 1.78 putts per GIR (43rd)
• 4^th: Stephen Gallacher (-18); 310 yards (3rd), 46.4% fairways (64th), 87.5% greens in regulation (1st), 55.6% scrambling (50th), 1.71 putts per GIR (16th)
• 5^th: Robert Karlsson (-17); 307 yards (4th), 78.6% fairways (4th), 66.7% greens in regulation (63rd), 87.5% scrambling (4th), 1.63 putts per GIR (3rd)

Easier conditions 14 years ago due to lighter winds led to some different metrics, and with similar blustery conditions to 12 months ago expected here this week I’d give the results from 2024 far more credence personally.

Strokes Gained: From a Strokes Gained perspective, the consistent statistic which tied the top 5 finishers together was undoubtedly SG Off the Tee:

• 1st: Dylan Frittelli: T: 4th; A: 1st; T2G: 1st; ATG: 33rd; P: 31st
• 2nd: Zander Lombard. T: 6th; A: 8th; T2G: 7th; ATG: 45th; P: 18th
• 2nd: Jesper Svensson. T: 5th; A: 35th; T2G: 28th; ATG: 62nd; P: 4th
• 4th: Frederic Lacroix. T: 1st; A: 7th; T2G: 4th; ATG: 48th; P: 39th
• 4th: Ockie Strydom. T: 9th; A: 18th; T2G: 14th; ATG: 39th; P: 19th

Key: T: SG Off the Tee; A; SG Approach; T2G: SG Tee to Green; ATG: SG Around the Green; P: SG Putting.

Incoming Form: It was a real mixed bag in terms of incoming form for the top 5 finishers last year. Ockie Strydom had missed 10 of his last 12 cuts and whilst eventual winner Dylan Frittelli’s form was marginally better, 41^st and 70^th from his two starts in the calendar year hardly signalled impending success. The other three all had a top 6 finish in one of their previous 4 outings:

• Dylan Frittelli: MC/MC/56/MC/MC/MC/MC/12/MC/20/MC/41/70
• Zander Lombard. 54/2/46/27/55/22/4/12/25/6/16/13
• Jesper Svensson. 35/29/2/37/2/13/11/70/2/MC/31/47
• Frederic Lacroix.  MC/MC/6/28/15/8/6/13/3/17/5/3
• Ockie Strydom. MC/MC/MC/MC/MC/MC/MC/62/MC/40/MC/MC

Whilst Paul Casey’s win here in 2011 shows that a 20-under winning total is possible around these parts, last year’s wind kept a lid on scoring and similar conditions could lead to a similar winning total this year with anything in double-digits under par could be in with a chance of winning the title. Maximising strokes gained from off the tee looks to be key, as does hitting as many greens as possible to avoid chipping in the blustery conditions.