Tour Championship 2024: Course and current form stats

• Fast and firm East Lake renovated since last year's event

• Stats favour Schauffele 12/53.40

• In-form Burns 40/141.00 can post lowest 72-hole total

Tournament Notes

• For a sixth straight year, the Tour Championship will be decided by a 72-hole handicap format. First employed in 2019, the 30 qualified players will tee-up with a handicap that reflects their position in the FedEx Cup standings, following the completion of Sunday's BMW Championship;

• Therefore Scottie Scheffler, the current FedEx Cup leader, will tee-off at East Lake on Thursday at 10-under-par. Xander Schauffele, who is second in the list, begins on minus eight, while those ranked between 26th and 30th (Chris Kirk, Tom Hoge, Aaron Rai, Christiaan Bezuidenhout and Justin Thomas) start on level par.

The full list of handicaps is as follows

FedEx Cup positions (1-30):
1st: 10-Under-Par
2nd: - 8
3rd: - 7
4th: - 6
5th: - 5
6th -10th: - 4
11th -15th: - 3
16th - 20th: - 2
21st - 25th: - 1
26th - 30th: Level Par

Course Notes

• This will be the 24th time that the Tour Championship has been staged at East Lake in Georgia. The course is located five miles east of downtown Atlanta, and is the venue where the great amateur Bobby Jones played much of his golf. East Lake fell into disrepair not long after hosting the 1963 Ryder Cup, but was renovated in the mid-1990s, and has been a regular PGA Tour stop for the past two and a half decades;

• East Lake is a lush parkland course where tight tree-lined fairways demand accuracy from the tee. The greens are usually firm and quick, with water coming into play on six holes. When the tournament was switched from its original October/November date to September, in 2007, East Lake's Bentgrass greens were re-seeded with Bermuda in order to cope with the much higher temperatures;

• And more restoration work has been carried out since last year's Tour Championship, under the guidance of architect Andrew Green. As for these changes: Fairways have been converted from Meyer Zoysia to Zorro Zoysia. This will firm up the ground and ultimately increase the amount of roll, allowing the venue's topography to possess a greater influence on the outcome of each stroke;

• All putting surfaces have been changed from Mini-Verde Bermuda to TifEagle Bermuda, which will hopefully improve consistency of roll. Many bunkers, both fairway and greenside ones, have been modified and relocated. Minimal changes were made to yardage, with the course approximately 140 yards longer than for last year's Tour Championship. It will now play as a par 71, rather than 70.

Click here for latest betting on this week's TOUR CHAMPIONSHIP

Three Selections

Always difficult to judge the mental approach of golfers this week, especially those teeing-off five or more strokes off the pace.

One player for whom the stats look great is Xander Schauffele 12/53.40. The American is in the form of his life, having scooped a brace of major titles this year.

He's ranked second in the world and also the current FedEx Cup table. And what makes him an even bigger threat is his course history at East Lake.

Three times he's fired the lowest 72-hole total here and, in 2017, won the tournament before it became this bizarre handicap event. His 28 rounds here average 66.96

Rory McIlroy 16/117.00 has lifted the winner's trophy at East Lake three times and in each of those years he has also posted the lowest 72-hole total.

The one concern regarding the world No 3 is whether he has shaken off his post-US Open blues.

He missed the cut at Royal Troon (The Open Championship), before finishing 68th out of 70 at TPC Southwind.

He responded last week at Castle Pines where he tied-for-11th but unless he starts quickly in Atlanta he may feel his chances of victory have completely slipped away. He tees-off six shots behind Scheffler.

One other name to consider is Sam Burns 40/141.00 who closed with a 65 on Sunday to finish in a tie-for-second at the BMW Championship.

He may find it difficult to overcome a six-stroke handicap deficit on Scheffler, but he could be worth backing regarding lowest 72-hole total.

Burns posted the fourth lowest total last year and his opening two FedEx Cup Play-Off events have each yielded a top-five finish.

Betfair Sportsbook

Stroke Averages

For This Week's Field (2018-23)
Average .... (Rounds)
66.96: Xander Schauffele (24)
67.31: Viktor Hovland (16)
67.38: Sepp Straka (8)
67.71: Rory McIlroy (24)
67.80: Justin Thomas (20)
68.44: Scottie Scheffler (16)
68.63: Billy Horschel (16)
68.63: Collin Morikawa (16)
68.83: Sam Burns (12)
68.85: Sung Jae Im (20)
68.88: Adam Scott (8)
68.92: Tony Finau (24)
68.95: Hideki Matsuyama (20)
69.00: Tommy Fleetwood (12)
69.10: Patrick Cantlay (20)
69.63: Keegan Bradley (8)
Min. No. of Rounds = Eight

Please Note: Tournament positions for 2019-23 relates to a golfer's 72-hole total, rather than their position after handicap. Thus, in 2023, Scottie Scheffler posted the 21st lowest 72-hole total, but finished 6th after his -10 handicap was taken into account.