The 2025 Legends Tour season started in fantastic style as the players lit up Aloha Golf Club with a birdie bonanza in beautiful conditions in southern Spain.
Colin Montgomerie rolled in a long birdie putt down a tier on the 18th green to the delight of the large galleries who followed him and local favourite Miguel Angel Jimenez right from their very first shots. It was the 2010 Ryder Cup captain’s 9th birdie of the day to join the cluster at the head of the field.
“It’s always nice to have a finish like that,” said the eight-time DP World Tour number one. “I was struggling a little bit coming in. I got quite tired. I hit a poor shot at 17, but I got up-and-down. Two putts would have been fine on the last and it’s happened to trickle in, so it was great.
“I enjoy it here and they’ve got good fans here. The weather was super and 65 is a very satisfying day. You can’t really knock nine birdies. A couple of mistakes, which you’re going to make around here, but the nine birdies were good, and the fans were out in force.”
There was a rising golfing star amongst those fans as Montgomerie and Jimenez were watched all day by 26-year-old Spaniard Angel Hidalgo, who beat Jon Rahm in a play-off to win the Spanish Open on the DP World Tour last year.
Last year’s Legends Tour number one Adilson da Silva remarkably birdied all four of the tough quartet of par-3s on the way to his 65. The Brazilian kept a blemish off his card as he started 2025 in the same fashion that he ended the 2024 season.
“I’m so glad,” said the seven-time Legends Tour winner. “We’ve been away for a couple of weeks and had a good event last week in Morocco (5th in the Trophy Hassan II on the PGA Tour Champions), so that was a good warm up for this week. My iron shots were better today than last week. I’m really happy with it.
“I hit two good shots to inside a foot on 17 and 13, so that helps. Those putts are much easier. And on the other par-3s, I hit good shots to probably eight or 10 feet away and holed the putts, so that was a huge bonus.”
Three-time DP World Tour winner Anders Hansen hasn’t played competitive golf in recent years, but there wasn’t much sign of any rust as the Dane reeled off seven red numbers in a 10-hole stretch from the 5th and finished with four pars to post his 65.
“It’s a great round,” said the 54-year-old. “I haven’t played tournament golf in a while, so I’m very pleased. You always hope to do well otherwise you wouldn’t play. I have my ambitions and I don’t like to play badly, but it happens. So today was a good day.
“It’s fun to be here. It’s fun to see all the guys that I haven’t seen for a long time. It’s very cool to catch up with old friends and be in contention. It gets you up, and it stresses your body to an extent that I’m not used to in daily life.”
Simon Griffiths is another player to carry good form into the new year. The Englishman picked up a win, a 2nd, a 3rd, a 4th, a 5th, a 6th and an 8th in his last nine tournaments last season to claim the Barry Lane Rookie of the Year Award. He had eight birdies and one bogey to make a strong start in pursuit of a second Legends Tour win.
The final man to sit at -7 is Lionel Alexandre, who earned his card at Qualifying School recently for the third year in a row. The Frenchman started on the 10th and birdied his final three holes of the day to jump into contention.
There are 11 former Ryder Cup players in the field. Among them, four-time European team member Jimenez and Legends Tour debutant Stephen Gallacher signed for rounds of 69 to sit in tied-16th.
Qualifying School graduate Matthew Cort is alone in 6th with an opening 66 on his debut, with two-time Masters champion Jose Maria Olazabal, Ryder Cup players Peter Baker and Joakim Haeggman, nine-time Sunshine Tour winner Keith Horne and three-time DP World Tour winner Mikael Lundberg tied-7th on -5.
