Paul Waring carries hot form and big dreams into DP World Tour Championship in Dubai

Englishman in line to play majors and even Ryder Cup after career-best win in Abu Dhabi at weekend

Paul Waring of England poses with the trophy on the 18th green after day four of the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship 2024 at Yas Links. Getty Images

If Paul Waring had paid just a little more thought to quite what was at stake for him on Sunday, this week might have gone down a whole lot differently.

As it was, he rocked up to Yas Links for the final day of the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship with his cap on back to front, wearing shorts, and acting like he had not a care in the world.

Of course, as Rory McIlroy likes to put it, all he was really doing was hitting a little ball around a field. But he held a slender lead in the championship, and was on the brink of the biggest win of his career.

Even as a thrilling last day unfolded, and some of the sport’s biggest names – McIlroy, Tommy Fleetwood, Shane Lowry among them – banked up behind him, he still did not waver.

At the 10th tee, while one of his playing partners worried about an errant tee shot, he tucked into a sandwich wrap instead.

And it all worked out perfectly. The 39-year-old Englishman closed out the second title of his career, his first Rolex Series win, and by far his biggest ever payday.

Life has changed markedly as a result. Now he can plan for the potential of playing at the British Open and the US PGA next season, for more time in the United States, and even a shot at Europe’s Ryder Cup team.

And to think, all he really had on his mind when he travelled down the coast road from Dubai to the capital was to make the cut for the 50-player, restricted- field season finale at his home course.

He had been 48th in the Race to Dubai ahead of Abu Dhabi. When he tees it up in the DP World Tour Championship at Earth Course, he will be sitting pretty in fifth.

“It has been absolute chaos, in all honesty,” Waring said of the past few days.

“It’s been a massive comedown. The adrenalin has finally come out of me a little bit. It’s kind of hit me what I’ve just achieved.

“I’m very proud of what I’ve been through and how I coped with it, but it’s been an absolute roller coaster these last few days.

“I didn’t realise the enormity of it when I was in the situation. Even afterwards, after lifting the trophy, nothing had sunk in about what I had actually gone and achieved.”

He says the prospect of playing on the US PGA Tour, as well as in the Ryder Cup, feels like a dream.

“It’s something that I think we aspire to play with the best players in the world, to forward my career and play on that side of the pond, with more world ranking points available, and potentially get in a few of the majors now,” Waring said.

“For me personally, of course [the Ryder Cup is] something we all dream of. Any level of golf, obviously the Solheim Cup, Ryder Cup, it's something that you grow up watching and feeling a part of.

“It’s my connection with the DP World Tour in Europe and the representation of Europe in that situation that would make me really want to play. But it's not just playing for me. It's about going and competing, getting the points.

“I'd only ever want to go if I was that person that could go and get a point. Because you have to be a beast to go and compete over there.”

Waring will go out in the third-last match of Round 1 of the tour championship, at what he terms “my backyard” in Jumeirah Golf Estates.

He will be in a match with Tyrrell Hatton, starting at 12.25pm, with Rasmus Hojgaard and Billy Horschel following 10 minutes later, before race leader McIlroy and Thriston Lawrence are the last match out on Day 1.

McIlroy is as good as assured a sixth Race to Dubai title, which will put him level on order of merit wins with Seve Ballesteros.

“[Ballesteros] was my dad's favourite player, and the immense impact he had on European golf from a Ryder Cup perspective and from what he did for the European Tour, he means a lot to the overall game of golf but specifically this tour,” McIlroy said.

“To draw level with him and to have a career that can somewhat stack up against his is very cool.”