Martin Kaymer golfer in the world, making him only the second German (after Bernhard Langer) to be the top-ranked golfer in the world. At the time he was the second youngest to reach world number one behind Tiger Woods, soon surpassed by Rory McIlroy in March 2012, who gained the top ranking at age 22. In April, he relinquished his number one ranking after eight weeks to Westwood, who won the Indonesian Masters. After reaching the number one ranking, Kaymer decided to undergo a swing change to be able to move the ball both ways. Frustrated with his disappointing results at the
Martin Kaymer in a tie for 20th place. In his first seven events of the season, he only made one cut. All of those events were played outside of Europe. Kaymer found immediate success once he started playing in Europe again. He finished in a tie for 15th at the Madeira Island Open, which was the season's first Tour event played in Europe. The following week, he finished in a tie for 3rd at the Portuguese Open. He made seven consecutive cuts from to . During that streak, his worst finish was a tie for 35th and he recorded five top 25