Out the Rough: BMW International Open (2025)

The DP World Tour looks to put a cap on its European Swing with this week’s BMW International Open in Munich, Germany.

This event once alternated between the Golf Club Gut Lärchenhof and the Golfclub München Eichenried between 2011 and the pandemic in 2020 but has since found a home at the Golfclub München Eichenried for the fifth consecutive year.

It once served as the DP World Tour’s lone stop in Germany each season until the Porsche European Open moved to the country. That event was dropped from the schedule this season in favor of the Austrian Alpine Open.

With The Open Championship in just two weeks time, this is the final chance for anyone not qualified to play their way into the field at Royal Portrush. 

The Field

This week’s field is headlined by multiple members of the LIV Golf Tour, both looking to use this event for different reasons.

Patrick Reed is qualified for The Open Championship and will use this week as a final tune-up for Royal Portrush in two weeks time. Sergio Garcia, David Puig and Martin Kaymer are looking to win this event to play themselves into the field for The Open Championship.

European Ryder Cup Captain Luke Donald too will be teeing it up this week.

A strong homefield contingent of German golfers will of course be in attendance, looking to claim victory on home soil. Of them include Nicolai Von Dellingshausen, the lone German to win on the DP World Tour this season (Austrian Alpine Open.) He’ll be joined by the likes of Marcel Seim, Kaymer, Matti Schmid, Stephan Jager, Freddy Schott, Yannik Paul, Maximilian Kieffer and Marcel Schneider as German golfers looking to claim victory on home soil.

Other notable attendees include Kristoffer Reitan, Martin Couvra, Eugenio Chacarra, Haotong Li, Laurie Canter, Keita Nakajima, Connor Syme, Marco Penge, Richard Mansell and Ewen Ferguson.

Ferguson won this event a season ago, holding off David Micheluzzi and Jordan Smith by two-strokes. He’ll be back to defend his title this week.

Other former winners of this event teeing it up this week include Li (2022,) Andrea Pavan (2019,) Pablo Larrazabal (2015 & 2011,) Fabrizio Zanotti (2014,) Davis Horsey (2010) and Kaymer (2008.)

The Course

The Golfclub München Eichenried in Munich, Germany plays as a par-72 at 7,284 yards.

It was designed by Kurt Rossknecht and opened in 1989 as a flat, tree-lined course with greens that run quite slowly.

There are many streams and ponds that run through the course. With the ponds in play, there are two half-island greens and 90 sand bunkers throughout. Water is in play on ten holes.

As the course has matured, so have the trees, which has helped force the scoring to lower. A 20-under-par score would not have been enough to win here in the early years. 2022 was the first time since 2009 that anyone went lower than -19.

Haotong and Pieters both carded scores of -22 before heading to a playoff in 2022.

A slight-renovation took place here prior to the 2019 edition of the event with the majority of the changes coming as modifications to all of the greens.

The course too was lengthened during this renovation which didn’t make that much of a difference. The winning score was just two strokes higher than it had been in 2017.

As previously mentioned with the maturing of the trees, this course was once a bombers paradise but has since turned to reward the straight hitters off-the-tee.

The difference maker here at Golfclub München Eichenried will be the putting on these slow greens. 

In all, this course rewards the best tee-to-green players on Tour.

The Weather

Temperatures will be extremely high to begin play on Thursday at 91-degrees. They’ll take a dive to 81-degrees on Friday and continue to fall to 74-and-76 degrees for Saturday and Sunday respectively. There is just a 15-percent chance of precipitation on Thursday, a 25-percent chance on Friday and a ten-percent chance across both days of the weekend. Winds will begin at ten miles-per-hour on Thursday before spiking to 17 miles-per-hour on Friday. From there, the winds will settle to eight miles-per-hour on Saturday and nine miles-per-hour on Sunday.

 Key Stats

• Strokes Gained: Tee to Green (SG: TTG)

• Strokes Gained: Putting (SG: PUTT)

• Par 4 Performance

• Scrambling

• Greens in Regulation Percentage (GIR%)

• Driving Accuracy Percentage

• Sand Saves Percentage

• Birdie or Better Percentage

• Bogey Avoidance

Betting Card

Francesco Laporta (+4500)

Laporta is in insane form coming into this week across the last month-plus. He most recently placed tenth last week at the Italian Open. Prior to that he placed seventh at the KLM Open, 27th at the Austrian Alpine Open and 11th at the Soudal Open. He is currently fourth on tour in bogey avoidance, seventh in both par-four average scoring and scrambling, 14th in SG: TTG, 17th in driving accuracy, 42nd in GIR%, 52nd in birdie or better percentage, 58th in SG: PUTT and 109th in sand saves percentage. He’s played this event three times over the last four seasons, missing the cut a season ago, placing 36th in 2022 and missing the cut in 2021. 

Marcel Schneider (+5000)

I needed to come into this week with at least one German on my card and per my stats-based model, there are few this week who line up statistically to this course better than Schneider. He is currently 11th on Tour in both par-four average scoring and bogey avoidance, 19th in GIR%, 25th in SG: TTG, 28th in scrambling, 37th in both SG: PUTT and sand saves percentage, 39th in birdie or better percentage and 56th in driving accuracy. In other words, he ranks 56th or better in each of the nine statistical categories I took into consideration this week. He is also in great form coming into this week. He placed seventh last week at the Italian Open. He also placed 65th at the KLM Open and second at the Austrian Alpine Open. He missed the cut here a season ago but placed 14th in 2023, 15th in 2022 and 62nd in 2021. 

Kristoffer Reitan (+6600)

This is some insane value in my opinion. Reitan hasn’t missed a cut since the Porsche Singapore Classic in March. In that same time span he placed 31st at the Hero Indian Open. 69th at the Volvo China Open, second at the Hainan Classic, 33rd at the Turkish Airlines Open, won the Soudal Open, placed second at the Austrian Alpine Open, 13th at the KLM Open and 46th at the Italian Open. He is currently seventh on Tour in par-four average scoring, 11th in birdie-or-better percentage, 29th in sand saves percentage, 39th in SG: TTG, 47th in driving accuracy, 48th in SG: PUTT, 50th in bogey avoidance, 54th in GIR% and 69th in scrambling. He’ll be making his tournament debut this week. 

Daniel Hillier (+9000)

Hillier missed the cut here a season ago but placed third in 2023. He too has missed just one cut dating back to the Ras Al Khaimah Championship in January. In that time span he has gone 24th at the Bepco Energies Bahrain Championship, 25th at the Qatar Masters, 36th at the Porsche Singapore Classic, 48th at the Hero Indian Open, 36th at the Volvo China Open, ninth at the Hainan Classic, missed the cut at the Soudal Open, placed 37th at the Austrian Alpine Open, 26th at the KLM Open and 41st at the Italian Open. He is currently 11th on Tour in par-four average scoring, 14th in birdie or better percentage, 23rd in SG: PUTT, 30th in GIR%, 49th in SG: TTG, 65th in bogey avoidance, 70th in driving accuracy, 73rd in sand saves percentage and 82nd in scrambling. 

Kazuma Kobori (+20000)

Kobori is currently second on Tour in driving accuracy, eighth in scrambling, 15th in par-four average scoring, 20th in SG: PUTT, 21st in bogey avoidance, 75th in birdie or better percentage, 76th in both SG: TTG and GIR% and 125th in sand saves percentage. He most recently placed 16th last week at the Italian Open. Prior to that he missed back-to-back cuts at the KLM Open and Austrian Alpine Open but did place 25th at the Soudal Open, 52nd at the Turkish Airlines Open, 45th at the Hainan Classic, 20th at the Volvo China Open and ninth at the Porsche Singapore Classic. He’ll be making his tournament debut this week.