Young Champs Stand Out
As Rolex & the European Tour mark the end of the 2016 season
Rolex, Official Timekeeper of The European Tour, celebrated the conclusion of the 2016 golfing season at the DP World Tour Championship. Among the field of golf’s elite are the next generation of Rolex Testimonees whose early professional performances bolster the future of European golf.
For Belgium’s Thomas Pieters, 2016 has been a breakthrough year. The Rolex Testimonee opened with a secondplace finish at the Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship in January, followed by a third-place finish at the True Thailand Classic in March. In August, under pressures of European Ryder Cup team selection, Pieters demonstrated his true courage by finishing second at the Czech Masters the week before a tenacious win at the Made in Denmark, secured by birdies at the last three holes. The performance earned him a captain’s wildcard pick to join the European team, of which Rolex is an Official Partner. Despite success on the European circuit, the 24-year-old was relatively unknown to American golf fans until his performance at the 2016 Ryder Cup. Pieters set a new European Ryder Cup rookie scoring record, securing four points from five matches, further demonstrating his skill on arguably the most pressured stage a golfer will ever experience – a Ryder Cup on away soil.
In the same year, the rising champion also aligned himself with some of the most legendary names in the game, past and present – the late Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player, Tiger Woods and Jason Day – by becoming a Rolex Testimonee. Pieters joins the most impressive champions to emerge in