Rory McIlroy, Tom McKibbin and Shane Lowry are all back in action this week at the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship and for differing reasons, the penultimate event on the DP World Tour calendar and next week’s DP World Tour Championship are big weeks for each of the trio.
McIlroy has been the Tour’s standout player since coming of age in 2011, and since Jon Rahm’s departure to LIV has made him a bit-part player on the European circuit, he’s comfortably the number one once again. A victory at the Hero Dubai Desert Classic – a record fourth title at the Emirates Club – and runner-up finishes at the Dubai Invitational, U.S. Open, Amgen Irish Open and BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth mean he’s comfortably clear at the top of the Race to Dubai rankings and poised to win his sixth Harry Vardon Trophy as the Tour’s leading points winner.
But it’s not yet a done deal, and Thriston Lawrence and Rasmus Højgaard are both hunting him down, with eyes on the top prize and the $2,000,000 bonus that accompanies it. And Højgaard has already picked his pocket once this year. Who can forget the heartbreaking manner of the defeat at Royal County Down? Winning the Race to Dubai might not make up for the loss in McIlroy’s mind, but drawing level with Seve Ballesteros on six titles and closing the gap to Colin Montgomerie’s eight would be a decent second prize.
Winning this week would take care of business with an event to spare, but he’s spent the four weeks since the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship working on technical flaws in his swing and is something of an unknown quantity.
While it’s all about legacy for McIlroy, his Holywood clubmate Tom McKibbin is arguably playing for higher stakes as his 2025 schedule hangs on these two events. Ranked 17th in the Race to Dubai, he’s already guaranteed to have his best season on Tour, both in terms or rankings and earnings, but having spent most of the year on course to earn a PGA Tour card, he now finds himself on the outside looking in.
43 points shy of Romain Langasque in the 10th and final place, his fate is in how own hands, but almost all of the big hitters are in town and nothing is going to be handed to him. He’s going to have to go out and earn it. But he’s shown that he’s more than capable of it, and when the chips have been down this year, he’s come through more often than not.
Five birdies in his final seven holes saw him qualify for his first major championship at U.S. Open Qualifying at Walton Heath back in May, then he birdied the 18th hole to make the cut on the number at Pinehurst a month later. Then, he went on a final-round birdie blitz at the Italian Open which secured his place at the Open Championship and he came within inches of winning his second DP World Tour title. Had Marcel Siem not birdied the 72nd and first playoff holes, McKibbin would be in eighth place instead of 11th, and the task would be that much simpler.
Shane Lowry can’t win the Harry Vardon Trophy, nor is his PGA Tour status up for grabs, but despite his most consistent season since moving to the United States, he hasn’t won an individual event and that’s a wrong he’ll be keen to right.
There’s also the small matter of the Ryder Cup which is less than 11 months away and making Luke Donald’s team is a huge goal. With Tyrrell Hatton and Jon Rahm likely to have limited involvement with the Tour in 2025 and potentially forced to rely on captain’s picks rather than outright qualification, Lowry will have his sights set on outright qualification for the first time rather than finding himself at the mercy of Donald and his assistant captains.
As a former winner of the Abu Dhabi Championship, albeit at the Abu Dhabi Golf Club rather than Yas Links, he’s got excellent Middle East pedigree and arrives with his batteries recharged after a four-week layoff and will be looking to end his season on a high note.
McKibbin will be the first of the Irish players to get action underway in the company of the Danish duo, Thorbjørn Olesen and Nicolai Højgaard. Olesen is one of the potential dangers to McKibbin’s PGA Tour hopes and is just 22 points behind the 21-year-old.
Lowry will join Tommy Fleetwood and Robert MacIntyre in the final group to hit the course on day one at 07:50 Irish time, while McIlroy will be able to keep a close eye on Lawrence and Højgaard as the three Race to Dubai leaders are grouped together at 05:23.