Paul McGinley is one of the marquee names that will tee it up on Carton House’s Montgomery Course when the Staysure Legends Tour’s Irish Legends takes place from July 10-12.
The 2014 Ryder Cup captain, four-time DP World Tour winner and three-time Ryder Cup winner as a player has only played a limited schedule on the European senior circuit as he balances media commitments with Sky Sports and Golf Channel in the United States, but he holds Carton House in very high esteem and paid tribute to the role the venue has played in Ireland’s impressive success in the professional game.
“Carton House is a very important venue in Irish golfing circles,” said the Rathfarnham native with strong links to Donegal where he served as tournament host for the 2022 Irish Legends at Rosapenna. “As the base for Golf Ireland, all our best players – Rory included – would’ve come through here, played here, and used this space, so it’s been the foundation for a lot of the success we’ve had in professional golf.
“That goes for Leona too, and all the other women we have on the ladies’ scene.
“It’s synonymous with Irish Opens as well – we’ve had Irish Opens here in the past. I played in the Pro-Am here at the KPMG Women’s Irish Open here last year, that was a big success too, so it’s great that we’re going to have a Legends Tour event here too. I’m really looking forward to playing the Monty again.”
Originally founded as the European Senior Tour in 1992, the Legends Tour – as it’s been called since 2020 – has grown in stature and now features 19 events worldwide having started with eight in the 1990s.
McGinley, who turns 60 later this year, is very happy with the growth of the tour and believes that the accessibility that it offers amateur golfers to play alongside the pros in a tournament setting, whilst still enjoying a comparatively relaxed atmosphere, has allowed the Legends Tour to thrive in the competitive modern professional golfing landscape.
“It’s doing really well,” he said. “It’s sustainable, and almost sustainable on its own two feet now, which is great. Ryan Howsam of Staysure has been an amazing supporter and a Godsend for us, but the business model is very different from that on the main tour.
“It’s more interactive, it’s more about Pro-Ams, it’s more about the experience of playing with famous golfers who have been on tour for a number of years. It’s working around that sort of access, and the business model is very much based on that.
“Everything is toned down a little bit from the pressures you have on the main tour, and fun is very much a big part of it.”
With major champions, multiple DP World Tour winners, and former Ryder Cup players and captains all regularly teeing it up on the Legends Tour, the quality of field generally speaks for itself.
But in addition to this, the venues that the Legends Tour plays at are a key component of its success and there has been a notable shift in recent years to include exotic destinations with top-class accommodation and top-tier courses, and the Fairmont Carton House hotel and accompanying golf courses most certainly fits the bill.
“We’re going to some of the best locations in the world,” McGinley said. “You look at some of the locations on the schedule this year, they’re phenomenal. Yes, it involves a lot of travel, but it’s amazing to be able to go to these incredible places. I was in Mauritius at the end of last year – what a place that is – and the hotels that we stay in, the golf courses we play are all fantastic.
“And we’re playing for prizemoney too which is always a win-win,” he grinned.
The Irish Legends has become one of the key determining events when it comes to identifying the eventual Order of Merit champion on the season.
In back-to-back years at Seapoint in 2023 and 2024, Peter Baker and Adilson da Silva tasted victory respectively and went on to be crowned the leading player on tour at the end of the season, and though James Kingston’s victory at Mount Juliet in 2025 bucked the trend, by birdieing five of his final six holes to win by one, he ensured that there was no shortage of drama for the spectators.
Four of the last five stagings have been won by one stroke or less, with a playoff being needed to decide two of those, and Baker’s incredibly impressive seven-stroke 2023 victory is the clear outlier.
General admission tickets are free for all three tournament days, REGISTER HERE FOR YOUR TICKET but you can fully immerse yourself in the tournament by availing of either the pre-tournament Championship Pro-Am or the Legends Tour Playing Experience packages.
With the Championship Pro-Am, teams of three amateurs play alongside a Legends Tour pro in a team format, enjoying all the ‘inside the ropes’ benefits, including access to the practice range and the Players’ Lounge post-round for dining and the prizegiving ceremony.
The Legends Tour Playing Experience offers the opportunity to immerse yourself even deeper, with everything that the Championship Pro-Am package entails, plus two additional rounds in tournament play alongside two further Legends, with amateurs competing in a Stableford competition and the leading 15 players advancing to play in the final round where the overall amateur winner will be crowned.
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