Introduction
The Asian Tour is the official regional sanctioning body for professional golf in Asia. The mission of the Asian Tour is to expand tournament golf so as to substantially enhance the careers of its members, thereby developing and growing golf in Asia while maintaining a commitment to the integrity of the game.
The Asian Tour, through its membership of the International Federation of PGA Tours, is the only recognised pan-Asian professional golf tour in Asia. This unique feature positions the Asian Tour at the pinnacle of professional golf in Asia; providing its events with Official World Ranking status.
Role
The Asian Tour’s principal role is the sanctioning, management, marketing, technical administration, development and promotion of professional golf tournaments in the region that form the series of events known as the Asian Tour.
The Asian Tour’s core activity is to generate playing opportunities and increase prize money for its members through the sanctioning and, in some cases, ownership of Asian Tour events.
History
In January 2004, the tournament playing professionals of Asia formed a new player representative body named the Asian Tour to ensure control over their careers and the development of professional tournament golf in Asia.
Since then, the Tour has gone on to establish itself as the region’s premier Tour, sanctioning over 306 events across 20 countries and offering over US$416 million in total prize purse from 2004 to 2015.
Three players, Jeev Milkha Singh, Kiradech Aphibarnrat and Anirban Lahiri, have the honour of earning over US$1 million in a single season when they won the Order of Merit titles in 2008, 2013 and 2015 respectively.
Thongchai Jaidee and Scott Hend are the two players to have broken US$5 million mark on the Asian Tour.
The Asian Development Tour (ADT) was launched in 2010 as a developmental circuit to unearth rising stars of the game. The first year saw five events being played while in 2015, a record 28 tournaments with US$2.2 million was offered to ADT players.
Asian Tour Order of Merit champions
- 2004 – Thongchai Jaidee (Tha)
- 2005 – Thaworn Wiratchant (Tha)
- 2006 – Jeev Milkha Singh (Ind)
- 2007 – Liang Wen-chong (Chn)
- 2008 – Jeev Milkha Singh (Ind)
- 2009 – Thongchai Jaidee (Tha)
- 2010 – Seungyul Noh (Kor)
- 2011 – Juvic Pagunsan (Phi)
- 2012 – Thaworn Wiratchant (Tha)
- 2013- Kiradech Aphibarnrat (Tha)
- 2014- David Lipsky (Usa)
- 2015- Anirban Lahiri (Ind).
- 2016 – Scott Hend (Aus)
- 2017 – Gavin Green (Mas)
- 2018 – Shubhankar Sharma (Ind)
- 2019 – Jazz Janewattananond (Tha)
- 2020/21 – Joohyung Kim (Kor)