British Golf Masters: England’s Joe Dean takes title with impressive round at The Belfry

British Masters final standings

-14 J Dean (English); -11 JS Olesen (Den), N Norgaard (Den), N Elvira (Spa), D Hillier (NZ)

Selected: -10 M Penge (English), T McKibbin (NI); -9 F Zanotti (pair); -8 M Wallace (English), E Ferguson (Scottish)

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Former supermarket delivery driver Joe Dean shot a sensational nine-under, bogey-free 63 to snatch the British Masters title at The Belfry.

It is the first DP World Tour victory in his 70th event for the 32-year-old Englishman, who is ranked 292 in the world.

He collected the trophy and around £440,000 in prize money, more than he had won in total in his previous 19 tournaments in the 2026 season.

“All those painful hours and all the work have finally led to something,” said Dean, who two years ago was delivering food to help finance his golf.

“It was a weird day where everything seemed fine and the putts were falling and I couldn’t do anything wrong.”

It caps a busy summer for the Sheffield golfer who won the inaugural Last Chance Qualifier on Monday of Open Championship week in July to earn the final place in the field at Royal Birkdale.

He then married Emily, who carried his bag that week and this week.

“I can’t thank him enough,” Dean said on Sky Sports. “I hope I made her proud.”

Dean started Sunday’s final round seven shots behind leader Dan Hillier and made a move with four birdies in his first six holes. Five more followed on the back nine, including a 10-footer on the last to set the goal at 14 under.

He then had to wait about 90 minutes to be crowned champion while rivals appeared and disappeared.

Dean eventually won by three shots over four players, including 2023 champion Hillier, in a tournament that was cut short by stormy conditions in Warwickshire.

More than nine hours of play were lost on Thursday and Friday, leaving organizers scrambling to complete the event before the predicted inclement weather returned.

Marco Penge, who had a great year in 2025 with three wins, led at 10 under after a brilliant 65 in the second round.

He also began the final round with that total after completing a 72 in the third round on Sunday morning.

Five birdies and two bogeys on his first nine holes of the fourth round catapulted Penge to a one-stroke lead with nine to play.

However, a third bogey of the round, on the 11th, halted his momentum and five more pars followed to leave him at 12 under with two to play.

Penge compounded the error of a wild drive into the trees on the par-five 17th by hitting a branch with his second shot and then had to go wide with his third.

That led to a bogey and with his challenge over, he also dropped a shot on the last to finish with a total of 72 and 10 under par.

A double bogey six at the sixth hurt Hillier’s chances of winning a second title. And although the New Zealander had two birdies on his last nine holes, he closed with a 1-over 73 to finish at 11 under par.

That left him in second place alongside the Danish pair of Niklas Norgaard and Jacob Skov Olesen, who scored a 71, and Spain’s Nacho Elvira, who scored a 69.

Paraguayan Fabrizio Zanotti threatened to upset Dean’s lead late after shooting four birdies in five holes during a purple streak on his back nine to get to 12 under, but he triple bogeyed the last after two-putting out of a fairway bunker and then finding water.

The British Masters was the first event in the race to qualify the European team to face the United States in next year’s Ryder Cup in Ireland.