"Just to be over here, to be able to play on The European Tour, is always a treat for me and to be in the position that I'm in, being the leader coming in, is an awesome feeling"
Wednesday 9 December 2020 19:41, UK
Patrick Reed is hoping the "awesome feeling" of leading the Race to Dubai can inspire him to a place in history at the DP World Tour Championship.
Reed has made the trip to the Jumeirah Golf Estates for the European Tour's season finale, and he feels good about his chances of becoming the first American to be crowned European No 1 on Sunday.
The 2018 Masters champion comes into the tournament with a 460-point lead over Tommy Fleetwood, and Reed is encouraged by his recent run of results having not finished lower than 14th in his last four starts, including a tie for third at the BMW PGA Championship.
"Just to be over here, to be able to play on The European Tour, is always a treat for me and to be in the position that I'm in, being the leader coming in, is an awesome feeling," said Reed.
"It shows that what I did throughout year was solid and really it comes down to this event. Come down and play well and hopefully make history.
"I feel good. I feel comfortable with the way the game is right now and it's last event of the year, so it's a sprint. Go out and leave it all out there and play as hard as you can and hopefully, by late Sunday, we have a chance to win not only the tournament but The Race to Dubai."
Reed has had to deal with a number of controversies during his career, but he insists he always feels popular among the players and fans when he appears in regular European Tour events.
"I've always enjoyed coming over, I feel like the guys always like having me over here and the fans have always been very supportive," added the world No 11.
"To be able to come out to an event like this, the last tournament of the year, go out and have a good showing, hopefully win this golf tournament, win The Race to Dubai, would mean a lot.
"But at the end of the day, when that gun goes off tomorrow it's strictly business, go out there and play shot by shot and try to shoot the lowest score you possibly can and see how everything falls out. The biggest thing is put yourself in position on Sunday and hopefully for a really fun Sunday."
Collin Morikawa lies third in the Race to Dubai standings and also has a legitimate shot at overhauling his fellow American despite the PGA champion not having previously played in a regular-season European Tour event.
"I didn't really make my decision for a while, but it was on my radar and obviously I've put myself in a really good position to close out 2020 on a great note," said Morikawa. "To be here and make this my first start on the European Tour means a lot.
"I think winning The Race to Dubai would mean a lot for my career, for myself. It would be a huge confidence boost, but there's a lot in between now and Sunday that has to happen but winning The Race to Dubai would mean a lot because I want my game to travel.
"I want to be a world player. I want to be able to bring my game anywhere, adapt to the different places I come to and this is just the first step of doing that."
Morikawa has posted only one top-10 finish in eight starts since capturing his maiden major title in August, admitting his game had become "scrappy" as he battled to avoid complacency.
"It hasn't been great," he added. "For me, it comes down a lot to my head, the mental side, and after the PGA, I was obviously very tired and very burnt out, but I just didn't set new goals. I felt like I was almost complacent.
"I felt good after the major win, but I was satisfied for at least the next few weeks, and that bled into the FedExCup Playoffs and after that the Masters.
"But I've had three weeks off coming into this week, so I did a full reset. I looked at this as a very big tournament, a tournament I really want to win. I want to win this, I want to win The Race to Dubai."
