The BMW Asian Open was a men's professional

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping wi ...

tournament that was co-sanctioned by the

Asian Tour The Asian Tour is the principal men's professional golf tour in Asia except for Japan, which has its own Japan Golf Tour, which is also a full member of the International Federation of PGA Tours. Official money events on the tour count for Wo ...

and the

European Tour The European Tour (currently known as the DP World Tour for sponsorship reasons), legally the PGA European Tour is the leading men's professional golf tour in Europe. The organisation also operates the European Senior Tour (for players aged fi ...

. The event was founded in 2001, as part of the European Tour's drive to expand into

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an are ...

, and

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

in particular. The first two editions were held at Ta Shee Golf and Country Club in

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...

, before the tournament was moved to the People's Republic of China in 2004, since when it was played at the

Tomson Shanghai Pudong Golf Club Tomson is both a surname and a given name. Notable people with the name include: Surname * Arthur Tomson (1859–1905), English artist * Chris Tomson (b. 1984), American musician * Jack Tomson (1918–2001), British hockey player * Laurence Tom ...

Pudong Pudong is a district of Shanghai located east of the Huangpu, the river which flows through central Shanghai. The name ''Pudong'' was originally applied to the Huangpu's east bank, directly across from the west bank or Puxi, the historic cit ...

Shanghai Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flowin ...

. In 2005

Ernie Els Theodore Ernest Els (; born 17 October 1969) is a South African professional golfer. A former , he is known as "The Big Easy" due to his imposing physical stature (he stands ) along with his fluid golf swing. Among his more than 70 career victor ...

set a new Asian Tour record for the biggest margin of victory when he triumphed by 13 strokes. In 2008 the prize fund was $2.3 million, an increase of more than fifty percent from the 2006 fund of $1.5 million.

Winners

Notes

References

External links

Coverage on the Asian Tour's official site
{{Former European Tour Events Former Asian Tour events Former European Tour events Golf tournaments in China Golf tournaments in Taiwan Recurring sporting events established in 2001 Recurring sporting events disestablished in 2008 2001 establishments in Taiwan 2008 disestablishments in China BMW