It is a case of fight or flight at the Genesis Championship at Woo Jeong Hills Country Club in South Korea this week.
Players battled for spots in the top echelon of the Race to Dubai rankings, but also the bottom. Guaranteeing activity on the tour in 2026 was Plan A for many.
It was the final event of the regular season before the DP World Tour Playoffs begin at the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship. Rory McIlroy unsurprisingly sits at the top of the tree again, with Marco Penge and Tyrrell Hatton coming next, but eyes were fixed on the bubble at the bottom of the spectrum where players were battling for their futures on tour.
In 2024, a cut-off allowed 114 players to retain their DP World Tour cards via the Race to Dubai Rankings. Recognisable names and fan favourites such as Eddie Pepperell and former Ryder Cup player Rafa Cabrera Bello didn’t play well enough this time last year to salvage their playing rights.
Fortunes can change quickly in professional golf, both downwards and upwards. It was 12 months ago when Penge was also one of the bubble boys who could’ve faced DP World Tour exile if not for a birdie on the 18th hole on Friday, which helped him make the cut and finish tied for 22nd. He has kept his card, and in 2025, he won three times to put himself on the cusp of Race to Dubai glory.
The provisional cut-off this year is 115th. Below are the players who sadly couldn’t keep their cards for 2026 and might resort to DP World Tour Q-School.
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Who lost their DP World Tour card via the Race to Dubai?
Ross Fisher
Ross Fisher was still plugging away on the DP World Tour in 2025. He hasn’t made a single top 10, and heading into the week in South Korea, it was always going to be a struggle to climb into the top 115 from 164th place in the Race to Dubai.
His best finish was tied for 18th back in Bahrain in February, and better signs were there more recently when he shot 65 in the opening round of the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship in Scotland.
Unfortunately for Fisher, once a Ryder Cupper and good enough for fifth at a US Open, his better days have deserted him for a while now. He hasn’t won on the DP World Tour for over 10 years.
Yannik Paul
The case of Yannik Paul summarises how cruel this game can be. Some European fans would say he should’ve been chosen to play for Europe at the 2023 Ryder Cup.
That year, he came second twice, and he is a winner on the circuit. He even played in the DP World Tour Championship in 2024, which is the tournament that comes at the end of the season and only features the top 50 players in the Race to Dubai rankings.
But a third-place finish at the Volvo China Open was his only top 10 this year, which left him in 116th position in the Race to Dubai rankings. There was still a chance of late salvation in South Korea, but he missed the cut.
Shubhankar Sharma
Shubhankar Sharma came tied for eighth at The Open at Hoylake in 2023, and followed that up with a tie for 19th in 2024 at Troon. But, the Indian hasn’t won on tour for six years, and he hasn’t found his best at all this term.
Remarkably, he didn’t even finish in the top 30 of a DP World Tour leaderboard this year, which is a staggering statistic for a player who is a proven winner and who reached the DP World Tour Playoffs at the end of last season.
Sharma earned his first DP World Tour win in 2017 at the Joburg Open, and followed this up at the Maybank Championship in 2018.
Matthew Baldwin
Matthew Baldiwn didn’t win on the DP World Tour too long ago at all. He took the SDC Championship title in South Africa in 2023, but even that season was full of erratic finishes and inconsistency.
Baldwin of Royal Birkdale only managed the top 25 twice this year. He came tied for 19th at the Nexo Championship in Scotland, so he left himself with it all to do at the Genesis Championship.
He shot 4-over through the opening two rounds, so didn’t play at the weekend.
Alfredo Garcia-Heredia
The Spaniard was on the brink of winning his first DP World Tour title in September last year, but he was beaten by Englishman Matt Wallace in a playoff at the Omega European Masters in Switzerland.
He showed a little form towards the end of this season, coming tied for 12th at the Irish Open at the K Club and tied for 17th at the DP World India Championship in Delhi.
Garcia-Heredia is another player to have made the DP World Tour Playoffs last year, but now he is out in the cold and above the Race to Dubai card cut-off.
NOW READ: How does the Race to Dubai work?
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