The Portugal Masters and the MasterCard Masters in Australia have been added to next year's PGA European Tour schedule, helping to take the total to at least 50 tournaments for the first time.
The schedule, which also includes the return of two events, starts next month with the HSBC Champions Tournament in Shanghai and will finish 12 months later with the Volvo Masters at Valderrama, Spain.
``We share with all sports the incentive to break records and we are naturally both delighted and encouraged to announce, that for the first time in our 36-year history, there will be more than 50 tournaments on the schedule,'' said Keith Waters, the director of international policy for the European Tour.
The MasterCard Masters will be staged next month at Huntingdale Golf club in Melbourne. The Portugal Masters, which has a first prize of 500,000 euros (US$603,000), is at Victoria Clube de Golfe at Vilamoura next October.
Returning to the schedule are the New Zealand Open on Dec. 30-Jan. 3 at Auckland and, although no venue has yet been announced, the Mercedes Benz Championship, formerly the German Masters, returns to Germany next September.
© The Canadian Press, 2007
