Field in Focus: at the Telenet Trophy
europeantour.com takes a closer look at what is the strongest field of the Challenge Tour season at the Telenet Trophy at Ravenstein Royal GC of Belgium.
In the field are:
4 Challenge Tour winners from 2012
Maximillian Kieffer got his season off to the perfect start at the first event of the year with a maiden title at the Gujarat Kensville Challenge 2012 after a playoff victory over home favourite Rahil Gangjee. Phillip Archer followed with another long haul victory down in Colombia, his third on The Tour, before Seve Benson returned to winning ways in Kenya and Eddie Pepperell picked up his maiden title last time out at the ALLIANZ Open Cotes d'Armor Bretagne.
15 of the top 20 on the
2012
Challenge Tour Ranking
| Challenge Tour Ranking | Player | ||||
| 3 | Phillip Archer | ||||
| 4 | Seve Benson | ||||
| 5 | Maximillian Kieffer | ||||
| 6 | Chris Lloyd | ||||
| 7 | Morten Orum Madsen | ||||
| 8 | Eddie Pepperell | ||||
| 9 | Lasse Jensen | ||||
| 10 | Jeppe Huldahl | ||||
| 11 | John Parry | ||||
| 15 | Tyrone Ferreira | ||||
| 16 | Callum Macaulay | ||||
| 17 | Nick Dougherty | ||||
| 18 | Chris Doak | ||||
| 19 | Gary Lockerbie | ||||
| 20 | Paul Dwyer |
43 Challenge Tour winners with 72 victories
Plenty of those teeing it up in Belgium have tasted glory on The Challenge Tour, with Nicolas Vanhootegem having claimed the most titles in his career so far with four, winning the Himmerland Open as far back as 1995 and as recently as the 2007 edition of this very tournament. Aside from home favourite Vanhootegem, there are seven players with three victories on The Challenge Tour, including Seve Benson and Phillip Archer who have added to their victory haul already in 2012.
9 European Tour winners with 13 titlesWins Player 3 Nick Dougherty 2 Scott Strange 2 Daniel Vanksik 1 Andre Bossert 1 Maarten Lafeber 1 Jose-Felipe Lima 1 Jean-Francois Lucquin 1 John Parry 1 Raymond Russell
26 different nationalities represented
 | Argentina | 2 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Australia | 3 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Austria | 4 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Belgium | 17 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Canada | 1 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Chile | 1 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Denmark | 7 | ||||||||||||||||
 | England | 32 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Finland | 5 | ||||||||||||||||
 | France | 16 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Germany | 4 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Ireland | 2 | ||||||||||||||||
 | India | 1 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Italy | 9 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Monaco | 1 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Netherlands | 2 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Norway | 5 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Portugal | 1 | ||||||||||||||||
 | South Africa | 1 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Scotland | 10 | ||||||||||||||||
 | South Korea | 3 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Spain | 11 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Switzerland | 3 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Sweden | 6 | ||||||||||||||||
 | United States | 1 | ||||||||||||||||
 | Wales | 2 |
4 players ranked between 21-30 on 2011 Challenge Tour
A quartet of nearly men are also in the field at the Telenet Trophy having narrowly missed out on gaining their European Tour card for 2012 after finishing just short of that all important top 20 on the Ranking in 2011. Anthony Snobeck, Florian Praegant, Jose-Felipe Lima and Chris Lloyd will all hope to go better this season and make the short jump up the Ranking and onto The European Tour next year.
