Stenson avoids fines by resigning from DP World Tour

Henrik Stenson has resigned from the DP World Tour after it imposed further sanctions on 26 players who competed without consent in LIV Golf events.

The DP World Tour issued bans of up to eight events and fines up to £100,000 for each tournament regulation breach.

“It is sad it has come to this, but it wasn’t unexpected,” said Stenson, 47.

Speaking to Golf Digest, the 2016 Open champion added: “They left me with no other choice so I have resigned. That’s it. I don’t really feel like it will do any good to dig into this too deeply.

“I’m appreciative of what the tour has done for me over the years. But they have chosen how they want to view the future. And we have obviously done the same. Unfortunately, they don’t go together at this point.”

The DP World Tour’s sanctions are based on individual cases with fines ranging from £12,500 to £100,000 for each breach and relate to the period between 22 June, 2022, to 2 April, 2023.

Stenson said he had not added up the total cost of his fines but added that they were “anywhere between £50,000 and £75,000 per LIV event”.

He played in four events in 2022 and has played in five in 2023. Two of those were after the 2 April cut-off, although the DP World Tour says “further sanctions” for events played after 2 April “will be considered in due course”.

Players that have resigned their membership will not be reinstated until they have paid their fine, from which point their suspensions would apply.

Stenson joins Lee Westwood, Ian Poulter, Sergio Garcia and Richard Bland in resigning their membership.

In April, an arbitration panel sided with the European-based tour in its legal battle against 12 players who had appealed against being fined £100,000 and suspended from the Scottish Open for playing in LIV Golf’s inaugural event in June 2022 without permission.