Scottish golf circuit handed big boost for 2025 schedule
Paul Lawrie’s Tartan Pro Tour secures Satellite status for Hotel Planner Tour
The growth of the Farmfoods Tartan Pro Tour, set up by Paul Lawrie to provide Scottish-based golfers playing opportunities during the Covid pandemic, has been illustrated once more heading into the 2025 campaign.
After becoming an Official Feeder Tour for the Challenge Tour for the first time two seasons ago, the Scottish circuit has now been upgraded to a Satellite Tour.
It means that any player who wins three times on the Tartan Pro Tour in the same season will secure automatic promotion to what is now called the Hotel Planner Tour following a recent rebrand and also have a category for the following year.
If that had been in place last year, Sam Locke, for instance, would have earned a step up before securing one of two 2025 cards up for grabs through the season-long Order of Merit.
The 2025 Tartan Pro Tour schedule has also been unveiled, with two new venues among another top-class collection of courses that has been teed up by Lawrie through his Five Star Sports Agency.
Musselburgh, a former Regional and Final Qualifying venue for The Open, will welcome the circuit for the first time on 18-20 August while Duddingston, one of the top courses in Edinburgh, will do likewise on 6-8 October.
The new campaign gets underway at Montrose on 14-16 May before Blairgowrie stages another early-season event on 18-20 May.
A North East Swing the following month will include visits to both Portlethen (9-11 June) and Newmachar (24-26 June), as well as the Scottish Par 3 Championship at Paul Lawrie Golf Centre on the outskirts of Aberdeen on (6-7 June).
Cardrona and Downfield will stage mid-summer events on 2-4 July and 16-18 July respectively before the following month marks a visit to Leven Links on 11-13 August.
The event at Musselburgh is then followed by ones at Spey Valley (8-10 September), St Andrews (15-17 September) and Gleneagles (23-25 September), with Duddingston the penultimate one before Trump International Golf Links in Aberdeen stages the season-ending Tour Championship on 13-15 October.
The latter will involve the top 30 players on the season-long points list, with two Hotel Planner Tour cards again being up for grabs.
Helped by two wins, Graeme Robertson topped last year’s Order of Merit and is gearing up to start his 2025 Challenge Tour campaign in India next month while Locke is making first outing of the season on the second-tour circuit with his new card in this week’s Cape Town Open.
"We're really happy with the schedule for this year and it's great to have The Musselburgh GC and Duddingston GC on board as hosts for the first time, joining a strong group of courses and venues which enable us to stage Tartan Pro Tour across the length and breadth of the country. We're really grateful to them all for being part of what we do,” said Lawrie.
“I thank Hotel Planner Tour for their continued support and the upgrade to Satellite Tour, as well, of course, our fantastic sponsors who make it possible for us to play for such healthy prize-money.
“It'll be intriguing to see how Sam and Graeme get on playing on the Hotel Planner this year and I'm sure this schedule will mean two more strong candidates will make the move up at the end of 2025 from Tartan Pro Tour to Hotel Planner Tour.”
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