WITH the US Open at Pinehurst teeing off next week, several of the top guns in the European Tour have decided to opt out of the KLM Dutch Open at Hilversums which started this morning in order to prepare.

It does fall at a rather awkward time, with a Major round the corner and on the back of a gruelling six-week period when the Tour has swung from Europe to the Far East and back again.

At last week's Celtic Manor Wales Open so many of the top players complained at suffering from fatigue that organisers were rumoured to be close to arranging a stretcher service from the eighteenth green back to the hotel.

Poor Colin Montgomerie crawled off the last green after missing the halfway cut looking as though he had been through the Death Valley rather than just the Usk Valley.

Wales winner Miguel Angel Jimenez has earned his break this week after lighting up the Roman Road and Thomas Bjorn will have enjoyed his two days extra rest after missing the cut last week.

Blackwood's Bradley Dredge was another golfer struck down by this collective tiredness malaise last weekend, but he has to drag himself out of the mire this week for one of the oldest events on the continent, dating back to 1912.

That first event took place a couple of months after the Titanic famously found a water hazard in the Atlantic Ocean, but Dredge will be hoping that last week's mediocre showing is not a sign that his improving form has run aground.

"I have been steadily improving and have a new coach in Claude Harmon, things are getting better each week," Dredge said.

A top ten at the BMW Championships two weeks ago and a second place at the Italian Open last month would suggest as such but Dredge admits he would have liked to be with the stay-at-home brigade.

"I am feeling mentally tired and perhaps could have done with a week off," he said. "But I am obliged to play in the KLM and once I get going will give it my best efforts."

Englishman David Lynn, who went close at the Celtic Manor, finishing eighth, returns to the scene of his maiden victory on the European Tour.

Last year he came from behind to fire a final round six-under par 66 and won by three shots ahead of Paul McGinley.

"Defending the title will obviously be a nice experience," said Lynn.

"I'm sure I will get some nice feelings walking around that course again regardless of what happens."

Wales Open runner-up Martin Erlandsson, halfway leader Alessandro Tadini and Monmouth's David Park are also among the competitors.