Bad year for the Irish on the mini tours.

The Challenge and Europro tours have finished for the year.The top 20 on the Challenge tour progress onto the main European tour for 2010 and on the Europro tour the top 5 move up to the Challenge tour for 2010.

It is a real struggle for these players to make ends meet and especially if you are travelling from Ireland all the time it becomes an expensive business.On the Challenge tour the 20th player earned 58,920 Euros.The best of the Irish was Simon Thornton who finished in 51st place and earned 24,738 Euros.To earn this Simon had to play in 12 events,which covered most of Europe.Winning on average of 2,000 per event Simon wouldn't be making a lot of money when you take away his travel,food and accommodation.Colm Moriarty(52nd)won the same ammount playing in 18 tournaments.

On the Europro tour the 5th placed player earned only 20,407 Euros to gain entry onto the Challenge tour next year.Brian McElhinney was the top Irish in 22nd place.He made £5,708 from 13 starts.At an average of £439 winnings per event Brian would have lost at least £250 per tournament.Barrie Trainor playing on the Europro tour for the first year made a good start.He made the cut in 8 from the 10 outings and finished 33rd on the merit table with £3,731.

CHALLENGE TOUR (IRISH)
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51ST: SIMON THORNTON (12 EVENTS) 24,738 EUROS.
52ND: COLM MORIARTY (18 " ) 24,155 "
105TH: GARETH SHAW (14 ") 10,030 "
111TH: JOHNNY CALDWELL (8 ") 8,837 "
164TH: MICHAEL MCGEADY (16 ") 2,470 "
169TH: ALAN MURRAY ( 8 ") 2,174 "
184TH: NOEL FOX (13 ") 1,702 "
185TH:PETER O KEEFFE (7 ") 1,656 "
194TH:RICHARD KILPATRICK ( 5 " ) 1,200 "
204TH:NIALL TURNER (2 " ) 605 "

EUROPRO TOUR
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22ND BRIAN MCELHINNEY (13 EVENTS) £5,708.
33RD BARRIE TRAINOR (10 " ) £3,731.
34TH PAUL O HANLON (10 " ) £3,664.
40TH MICHAEL COLLINS (7 " ) £3,365.
50TH TIM RICE (12 " ) £2,885.
59TH BRENDAN MCCARROLL (13 " ) £2,064.
67TH MARK STAUNTON (8 " ) £1,454.
73RD STEPHAN GRANT (7 " ) £1,165.
87TH MARK CAMPBELL (8 " ) £755.
102ND RICHARD KILPATRICK ( 9 " )£505.
103RD CIAN MCNAMARA (6 " ) £500.
104TH JUSTIN KEHOE (10 " ) £495.
106TH PAUL MCDONALD (5 " ) £442.
108TH DANIEL SUGRUE (7 " ) £425.
119TH JONATHAN MALLON (10 " )£352.
123RD SHANE FRANKLIN ( 6 " ) £280.
132ND MICHAEL LAVELLE ( 10 ") £202.