Golfers with most European Tour wins

This is a list of golfers who have won ten or more events on the European Tour since it was established in 1972. There are some complications in preparing such a list, and different publications have produced different numbers. In summary this list includes individual wins in tournaments which counted towards the European Tour Order of Merit for the relevant year, but only for players who have been full members of the European Tour for at least one season. The detailed criteria are listed at the end of the article.

The number of wins a player can accumulate on the European Tour depends in part on how many years he devotes to the tour. There have always been some leading European players or European Tour members from outside Europe who have gone on to play part or full time on the U.S. based PGA Tour and cut back their commitments in Europe, and this seems to be an increasing trend.

Many of the players on the list have won many events on other tours and unofficial events. The numbers in the "Majors" column are the total number of major championships the player won in his career whether or not he was a member of the European Tour at the time or the major was co-sanctioned by the European Tour.

This list is up to date through 28 September 2008.

Notes:
*Ballesteros's win in the 1976 Lancome Trophy is omitted from his win list on his profile on the European Tour's official site, so only 48 wins are listed. This appears to be an error (1976 was the first year that the Trophy was an official money event, and it is included in the 1976 schedule on the official site, whereas the 1975 event was not). Some sources state that Ballesteros has 50 European Tour wins, but the basis for that figure is unclear.
*Bernard Gallacher also won an event in 1971. This is included in his win list on the European Tour's official site as 1971 results on the pre-Tour European circuit have been uploaded to the site, but the Tour officially began in 1972 so it is excluded here.
*Tiger Woods has won 35 events sanctioned by the European Tour, most of which were major championships and World Golf Championships events staged in the United States. [http://www.europeantour.com/default.sps?pageid=127&pagegid=%7BAEFB93B0%2DEFF5%2D4C05%2DAB0F%2DFD08D947D944%7D&infosid=3&eventid=2007022&reportid=56312]
*Graham Marsh of Australia won eleven events on the European Tour between 1972 and 1985, but never played in Europe more than seven times in a season.

Detailed criteria

*Only members of the European Tour are counted. As all elite golfers enter the four major championships and the three individual World Golf Championships each season it is possible for a player to accumulate ten wins in European Tour sanctioned events without ever joining the European Tour, and Tiger Woods had done so by early 2001.
*The three U.S. based majors were not designated as European Tour events until 1998, so victories in them before that date are excluded. This is in contrast to the list of golfers with most PGA Tour wins, which includes Open Championship wins before that tournament became an official money event in 1995, because they were retrospectively designated as PGA Tour wins in 2002. The European Tour is not known to have made an such retrospective designation with respect to the three U.S. majors. Counting all major victories would promote Nick Faldo to fourth place on the list and cause some minor changes further down.
*The same applies to wins in the Wentworth World Match Play Championship before 2003, and once again the main effect of counting all wins in this event would be to promote Faldo.
*The win lists in the player profiles on the European Tour's official site include some miscellaneous items which are not regular individual tour wins and are therefore excluded: wins in 18 hole pro-ams associated with European Tour events; wins in the Volvo Bonus Pool; team wins in the Seve Trophy; wins on the Challenge Tour and the European Seniors Tour.

There are additional players who won ten or more tournaments on the pre-tour European circuit and the European Tour in the period straddling 1972 who are not included on the list.

ee also

*Golfers with most major championship wins
*Golfers with most PGA Tour wins
*Golfers with most Japan Golf Tour wins
*Golfers with most Asian Tour wins