2026 VidantaWorld Mexico Open preview: PGA Tour opener in Mexico

This week, the PGA Tour continues the FedEx Cup Fall in Mexico for the first of two events with the moved Vedanta World Mexico Open, and we're here with a preview. I'm Ryan Balaji with Golf News Net. This week, the PGA Tour schedule heads to Vallarta, Mexico, to the Vedanta-Vallarta Golf Course, the newly rerouted version of it, for the Vedanta World Mexico Open. This was a tournament that was previously played in the early portion of the PGA Tour calendar year schedule. Then it was moved to the FedEx Cup Fall. as it really no longer kind of fits that portion of the PGA Tour model. So now it is the first of two events played in Mexico in the FedExCup fall. The other we played in Los Cabos. That'll be next week, the Worldwide Technology Championship. So this week really starts what amounts to the real fall. So you have about 21 of the world top 100 competing in this. You have basically everybody that's somewhere between 80th and 150th in the FedExCup fall standings playing in this event. They're all trying to get in that top 100 in the FedExCup fall points by the end of the fall so that they maintain their playing privileges for the 2027 season. If you can somehow find yourself between 51 and 60 at the end of the FedExCup fall, you get two signature starts. Those two events out in California to start the year. Defending champion here is Brian Campbell, the shortest hitter on the PGA Tour. He won this event back in February of 2025, doing so in a playoff over Aldrich Potkeyder, who's one of the longest hitters on the PGA Tour. And this golf course is really set up for longer hitters. There's not a ton of rough off the tee. The greens are relatively slow, so it's kind of target practice for the best players in the world. And with a rerouted golf course, this should yield some more birdies as the conditions are also softer this week. They're playing for a $6 million purse, so $1,080,000 to the champion, 500 important FedExCup fall points to the winner, and you're going to get 31 official World Golf ranking points if you're the victor this week.