The European Tour's financial earnings rankings were known until 2009 as the Order of Merit, but it has been replaced by the Race to Dubai concept, the name reflecting a new end-of-season tour championship to be held in Dubai in November.

At the top of the financial standings is Colin Montgomerie, the Scot who finished at the summit of the Order of Merit eight times between 1993 and 2005, winning more than 23 million euros of prize money up to the end of 2008.

Voted Rookie of the Year by members of the European Tour and the Golf Writers' Association in 1988, he continues to compete on the Tour at the highest level more than 20 years later.

That figure puts him nearly two million euros clear of South African Ernie Els, one of the world's finest players over the last two decades, and a consistent supporter of the European Tour during that time, winning the Order of Merit in 2003 and 2004.

Els' total prize-money haul of over four million euros in 2004 is almost a million ahead of the winning total of any other player. His 24 wins on the European Tour is the seventh-highest total achieved by any player.

Ireland's Padraig Harrington, who lifted the Harry Vardon Trophy (presented each year to the winner of the Order of Merit) in 2006 before going on to win the Open Championship in 2007 and 2008, is next on the list of all-time European Tour money-winners with over 19.5million Euros.