Lindell, in brilliant form, challenges the world's best in the iconic Wentworth tournament
Oliver Lindell will be representing Finland this week at the DP World Tour's flagship tournament in Wentworth. The Porvoo native earned his place in the competition with his recent top performances and will be competing in one of the most prestigious tournaments on the calendar starting on Thursday. The BMW PGA Championship, part of the Rolex series, is the first Rolex tournament in Lindell's career, and he will be aiming for the top spots from an excellent starting position.
"The setting is fantastic. The weather is going to be pretty poor from now on, with rain forecast for every day. Yesterday we played a long practice round, which gave us plenty of opportunities to get some reps in on the course. It's nice to start the third week in a row in good form, knowing that we have two weeks off ahead of us, so it's worth doing well here," said Lindell.
Qualifying for this week's competition means missing next week's French Open. However, on Sunday 21 September, Lindell will be challenging his competitors in a charity competition, the "Oliver Lindell Texas Scramble", played on his home course in Virvik. There is still time to register for the competition if you want a unique opportunity to compete against Finland's hottest golf name.
The Wentworth course, known as one of the world's most spectacular and best golf courses, is not the longest on the tour, but it will require versatility. Lindell, who likes to curve the ball from left to right, will have to adjust his top shot this week, as will many others.
"The course is tight and will really test all aspects of the game. There will be a few more challenging openings for me. There are dogleg holes that turn to the left, so you have to be able to hit a draw off the tee. That's when you hit the draw, and if you can't do that, you're going home on Friday."
The list of participants in the competition is extremely strong, so going through it would require a separate publication. Previous winners include Billy Horschel (2021 & 2024), Shane Lowry (2022) and last week's winner Rory McIlroy (2014). Also competing are Tommy Fleetwood, winner of this season's PGA Tour FedEx Cup, former world number one Jon Rahm, and Nordic players Ludvig Åberg and Viktor Hovland.
However, Lindell does not consider his chances of success to be any weaker than in recent weeks, and true to form, he is not going to bow down to the superstars.
"There's nothing particularly special about this week, as many of the players from last week are also taking part. Of course, the list of names is stronger again, but they will also need to have a successful week. I will try to give it my best shot, and we will see on Sunday how far that takes me," said the Finn.
Lindell, who has once again improved his career-best world ranking (177), will start his competition on Thursday at 12:20 p.m. Finnish time. He will be followed for the first two days by Brandon Robinson-Thompson of England and Kazuma Kobori of New Zealand.