Other Qualification Methods
Other methods of getting onto an elite golf tour include:
- Finishing near the top of the money list/order of merit on the tour's official developmental tour, such as the Web.com Tour for the PGA Tour, the Challenge Tour for the European Tour or the Symetra Tour for the LPGA Tour.
- Winning a specified number of tournaments on the tour's official developmental tour may grant an exemption. For example, both the PGA Tour and European Tour grant a "performance promotion", also informally known as a "battlefield promotion", to any player who wins three events on its developmental tour in a season. Such a player is exempt from qualifying on the higher tour for at least the remainder of that season; on the PGA Tour, the exemption runs for the entirety of the following season.
- Winning a tournament on the tour after gaining entry to it through its qualification event or as a sponsor's invitee. Tiger Woods secured his PGA Tour card by winning the Las Vegas Invitational in October 1996 as a sponsor's invitee, and went on to win another event two weeks later.
- Winning enough money on multiple events on the tour as a qualifier/sponsor's invitee to meet whatever criteria the tour may lay down for promotion to full membership. Even without his 1996 tournament wins, Woods would have earned his tour card by finishing in the top 125 on the 1996 money list, since he had three other top-5 finishes as a sponsor's invitee that season.
- Special categories for elite golfers: Most tours offer automatic memberships to golfers with outstanding achievements such as winning a recent major championship or making a recent Ryder Cup or Presidents Cup team.
For complete lists of exempt categories on various tours, see the following pages:
- PGA Tour
- European Tour
Read more about this topic: Qualifying School
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