Augusta Nationwide Golf Membership and The R&A introduced Tuesday that winners of six nationwide opens — the Scottish Open, Spanish Open, Japan Open, Hong Kong Open, Australian Open and South African Open — will earn invites to the Masters and The Open Championship beginning subsequent 12 months.
Augusta Nationwide Golf Membership additionally introduced that winners of the PGA Tour’s seven FedEx Fall tournaments will now not earn invites to the Masters, until they qualify one other method.
The governing our bodies stated the brand new qualification modifications for winners of the six nationwide opens will “guarantee robust worldwide pathways into each main championships from a number of skilled excursions, recognizing the worldwide power of elite skilled golf.”
“The Masters Event has lengthy acknowledged the importance of getting worldwide illustration amongst its invitees,” Augusta Nationwide Golf Membership and Masters chairman Fred Ridley stated in an announcement. “We, together with The R&A, have a shared dedication to the worldwide sport and are proud to work collectively.
“Right now’s announcement strengthens our organizations’ collective imaginative and prescient of rewarding high expertise around the globe who rise to the highest of historic nationwide open championships. We hope this formal recognition shines a brilliant mild on these gamers and the occasions they are going to symbolize on the Masters and The Open, starting subsequent 12 months.”
The winner of the Scottish Open already earned an invite to the Masters as a result of it is a co-sanctioned occasion by the PGA Tour and DP World Tour with a full allotment of 500 factors that rely towards qualifying for Tour Championship.
Augusta Nationwide Golf Membership modified one among its qualification classes to “particular person winners of PGA Tour occasions that award a full-point allocation utilized to the season-ending Tour Championship,” which means winners of the seven occasions within the PGA Tour fall schedule will now not be invited to the primary main championship of the season in the event that they have not in any other case certified.
The Masters has the smallest area of the 4 majors and prefers it keep below 100 gamers to reinforce their expertise.
It is the primary important change to the Masters qualifying classes since 2013, when Augusta Nationwide eradicated inviting the highest 30 from the PGA Tour cash record and decreased a class for the highest finishers within the earlier Masters from 16 to 12.
These tournaments embrace the Procore Championship, Sanderson Farms Championship, Baycurrent Traditional, Financial institution of Utah Championship, World Huge Expertise Championship, Butterfield Bermuda Championship and the RSM Traditional, which usually have weaker fields than occasions through the FedEx Cup season.
Worldwide golfers have been capable of qualify for The Open via the R&A’s Open Qualifying Sequence, which consists of 15 tournaments in 13 international locations around the globe.
“We share the identical objective as Augusta Nationwide to supply locations in each The Open and the Masters to gamers competing in nationwide opens and by doing so to assist to showcase and strengthen our sport in these areas,” Mark Darbon, chief government of The R&A, stated in an announcement. “This creates an excellent alternative for gamers in all elements of the world to qualify and we firmly imagine it will proceed to complement the standard of the fields in each main championships.”
The opens recognized by the R&A and Augusta Nationwide are a part of the Asian Tour (Hong Kong), Japan Golf Tour, Sunshine Tour, PGA Tour of Australian and European tour.
Although not the target, it additionally creates alternative for gamers from Saudi-backed LIV Golf. The R&A created an exemption class for the main LIV participant this 12 months. Augusta Nationwide didn’t, preferring to make use of its particular invitation if it feels somebody ought to be invited. Joaquín Niemann has acquired that invitation twice.
However LIV gamers, whereas suspended by the PGA Tour, can enter these nationwide opens to chase spots to the Open and Masters. Niemann’s invitation to the Masters in 2024 was largely as a result of his Australian Open victory.
The Related Press contributed to this report.
