The Race to Dubai's grand finale, The Dubai World Championship, will be played at the Jumeirah Golf Estates at least until 2013.
Jumeirah - the final hole
And an announcement to that effect is expected to be made by the European Tour at this year's Dubai World Championship next month, according to a report in the Middle East Golfer.
Leisurecorp, promoters of the Dubai World Championship, and lead sponsor DP World, have the right to extend their contract with the European Tour by a further two years, and it is thought all parties have now reached a mutual agreement to do so.
If, prior to this, there had been some uncertainty about Dubai's ties with the European Tour's end of the year, grand finale,this was almost certainly because of an announcement during last year's Dubai World Championship by European Tour CEO George O'Grady who intimated that the tournament could be moving to The Els Club, or even to neighbouring Abu Dhabi.
This was at a moment in time when Dubai and Leisrecorp were feeling the effects of the world wide money crunch and were pulling in their horns - but Leisurecorp's director of sales and marketing Colin Smith has told Middle
East Golfer that his company, which ended it's sponsorship of the South African Open during the Dubai downtown, would very much like The Race to Dubai to finish at Jumeirah as before..
"This is the last year of the current arrangement and we would very much like the Race to Dubai to stay exactly where it is," he was reported to have said.
"Our primary objective is to keep the Race to Dubai in Dubai, wherever that may be. Jumeirah Golf Estates is a good host, so there is no reason right now to look beyond it as a venue," he added.
O'Grady voiced similar sentiments when he told the KPMG Golf Business Forum in Dubai earlier this year: "At the moment, all our deliberations are positive and there is no reason why the Race should move.
"We are talking to everybody concerned at the moment. Our hope would be that our partners here in Dubai are very happy with the way those discussions have gone."
Indeed, the word in Dubai is that the two-year extension by Leisurecorp and DP World is likely to be followed by a further three-year contract, keeping the event in the region until 2016 and with the strong possibility that linked to this, the prize pool will be increased from $7.5m to $10m by 2014.
In the meantime Nick Tarratt, director of the European Tour's International Office in Dubai, believes the Race to Dubai has been a great marketing tool for Dubai since it was launched in 2009 and it has also made its mark on the international golf stage in that it has help brighten up the international golf image of the European Tour.
"I don't think it is mere coincidence that European golf has flourished since the Race to Dubai started," he said.
"You have to give the concept some credit for the recent success behind European golf."
golf365.com