Kaymer seeks to move up money list with good show at Portugal Masters

Martin Kaymer has set his sights on stealing a march in the Race to Dubai standings at this week's Portugal Masters.

The 26-year-old German is fifth on the list, but a victory would dramatically improve his position with the four players above him -- Luke Donald, Rory McIlroy, Charl Schwartzel and Lee Westwood -- taking the week off.

"My goal is to finish as high as possible, and the highest possible is to win, and I feel like I can win," he said. "Otherwise I wouldn't have come here. It's a big tournament on the European Tour, and talking about the Race to Dubai, you can still make a lot of points at this tournament in order to move up a few spots."

The world No. 6, who finished 2010 as European No. 1, will be looking to secure a first European Tour title since January and knows he will have to go low.

"The golf course seems easy," said Kaymer, who was runner-up to Thomas Bjorn in the Omega European Masters in Switzerland last month. "There's not a lot of rough, so I think people will see a lot of birdies."

The 2010 PGA champion has positive memories of the Oceanico Victoria Golf Course, having opened with a 61 in 2007 before slipping into a tie for seventh.

"Everything really went my way," he recalled. "It was just a brilliant day in general. Obviously it's nice to remember."

As for his current form, Kaymer added: "I've been playing fine.

"I was happy with my play at St. Andrews for the Alfred Dunhill [Links Championship]. It was a shame on Saturday when I made 36 putts on an easy golf course -- I shot myself out of the tournament. I look forward to playing here, it's a big tournament.

"It would be nice to finish in the top three in the Race to Dubai at the end of the year," he explained. "If you're a competitor and an athlete, you want to finish as high as possible -- you want to fight until the season is done. Then I have six weeks off where I can chill, but before that I would like to put 100% in and see if it works out."

Like Kaymer, defending champion Richard Green also has happy memories of the Algarve and will be basking in the glory of last year's triumph when he takes to the course this week.

"It's brought back some nice memories," said the Australian. "I never really had chance to celebrate this win last year.

"I went on to Valencia the week after and Valderrama after that," he added. "By the time I'd played those few tournaments and was back in the swing of playing golf, I never really celebrated as much as I would have liked."

This time around, Green cannot wait to get going after having six weeks off.

"I'm definitely mentally ready to go, wanting to play -- it's nice," he added. "My body's probably a little bit stiff and not quite there but it comes through playing tournaments - it's a different physical sharpness.

"You play tournaments, you get good at playing tournaments. You can practise all you like and you become a very good practiser but playing tournaments and becoming tournament-sharp is a different thing," he said. "I'm hoping to bring that to a competitive level over the next couple of weeks and be ready to play at Valderrama and also into Dubai."