Thomas Pieters is aiming to use this week's Mallorca Golf Open as a springboard as he looks to force his way into the field for the season ending DP World Tour Championship, Dubai.
The big hitting Belgian arrives at Golf Santa Ponsa 67th in the Race to Dubai Rankings in Partnership with Rolex, needing to squeeze his way into the top 50 over the next three events to make a seventh consecutive trip to Jumeirah Golf Estates.
Pieters has only ever missed the season finale once, in his rookie campaign, and a good week here in the Balearic islands could go a long way to helping him compete at the final Rolex Series event of 2021.
"That's obviously the main goal for me right now," he said. "I added a couple of tournaments and I'm playing everything until then just to give myself the best chance and hopefully I can do it."
After two top tens in three events, Pieters missed the cut by one shot at Valderrama last week, but the 29-year-old feels his game is starting to peak at the right time.
"My game was not very good last week so we've got to just take that as it is," he said.
"I had a bad week and I still managed to miss by one so if I can take one positive it's that I can still score.
"I was making good steps forward and last week I just didn't feel it. Obviously at Valderrama it's so tight, there's zero room for errors. I just put myself on the back foot after the first day but overall I'm pretty happy with where my game is at."
The European Tour returns to Mallorca this week for the first time in a decade, with Golf Santa Ponsa I playing host for the seventh time in the third event of the season's second Spanish Swing.
Overall I'm pretty happy with where my game is at
Pieters admits new courses can produce a unique challenge but he is looking forward to taking on the test on the west of the island.
"I played some yesterday and today and you just try to take everything in, look at the whole course, the greens - how it slopes, back to front, left to right," he said.
"You try to do as much work around the greens as possible as well. You'll still find new stuff once you go round Thursday, Friday, Saturday.
"It's interesting. There's some driveable par fours. Small greens, you've got to be accurate with the irons, the greens are rolling fine so it's going to be a tough one if the wind gets up.
"Four times in the 60s will do just fine."
