Shocker: Van de Velde Quits Full Time Play, World Is Stunned To Learn He Was Still Playing Full Time

Norman Dabell reports:

"It's not like I'm going to stop playing completely but I'm definitely going to slow down a lot," Van de Velde told Reuters in a telephone interview on Tuesday.

"My career I can compare to a good bottle of wine. You take a glass and enjoy it; you take a second glass and really enjoy it; a third, then the bottle is getting empty.

"I've been going around the world for so many years and at the end of the day you can only do so much. Next year I will only play the tournaments I really enjoy.

"I don't know exactly how many I will play but the maximum will be a dozen," added the popular Frenchman who was struck down in 2007 by a virus which at one stage looked likely to end his career then.