Innehållsförteckning för September 2022 från Compleat Golfer

5 Brooks Koepka What you see is what you get when talking about Brooks Koepka. He’s the same guy off course as he is on. His golf game is seriously impressive, i mean, me guy’s iron play could be the best on the planet. Mix that with his strength and power and you’ve got a ball-striking machine. Somehow the man also possesses incredible touch around the greens, creating the complete package. But that’s not his X-factor. The man’s confidence is second to none. He knows his ability. He knows his capabilities. So it’s no surprise the man is a four-time Major champion. Having that self-belief makes the difference coming down the stretch on a Sunday afternoon. Knowing you can do it, having done it before, is why he’s one of…

Luke Donald is unlikely to have noticed Henrick Stenson in the revolving door as he walked in to accept the job as European Ryder Cup captain when the Swede was headed out. Stenson’s stint as Ryder Cup captain for next year’s much-anticipated event didn’t last too long. Perhaps not even time for the coffee to get cold. His head was turned by an offer from the Saudis involved with the LIV Golf Series and he was off. To Bedminster in fact, where, under the gaze of former president Donald Trump, Stenson won at the first attempt, pocketing $4-million for three days’ work. The big payoff – not including a signing bonus reported to be about $50-million – came less than two weeks after the 46-year-old Swede decided to join the…

More people are talking about golf now than they were a year ago. That’s a good thing – right? Well it’s complicated. Much of it has been about the LIV Golf Series, and now it’s starting to gel nasty And that’s a bad thing. The forward defence shot played by almost every golfer who has joined the Saudi-backed LIV Series has been that it’s about growing the game’ At least the straight-arrowed commentator David Feherty admitted, “it’s about the money’, when he crossed the floor. The problem is that the lawyers are now getting involved as things start to escalate, as was predicted at the outset They’re the towtruck drivers at a hot-spot intersection, waiting for the inevitable collision, and then they get to work. Right now it’s become a…

For years, the stigma surrounding high-lofted fairway woods has been they are only for women and older players. There was a feeling that carrying anything beyond a driver, a 3-wood and maybe a 5-wood is a weakness in a golfer. ‘Yes, there was a stigma about it, but at the end of the day, if a Tour player sees a performance benefit, he’s going to forget about the stigma,’ said Todd Chew, senior Tour representative of TaylorMade. JJ van Wezenbeeck, Titleist’s director of players promotions, also sees the old thinking fading away. Tour players only care about how it looks, sounds and feels,’ he said. Chew said the emergence of 7-woods on the PGA Tour is the result of several factors. First, manufacturers are making fairway woods with hotter faces…

MEN JUNIORS 1 (8) Keagan Crosbie (Centurion CC] DNQ (DNQ) Aldrich Potgieter (Pinnacle Point GC) 2 (2) Stefan Jacobs (Randpark GC] 3 (3] Ivan Verster (Pinnacle Point GC] 4 [1] Pascal Gunther (Bryanston CC) 5 (4] Jack Buchanan (Milnerton GC) 6 (5) Daniel Bennett (Royal Durban GC) 7 (6) Amilkar Bhana (Country Club Johannesburg] 8 (7) Jaden Deltel (Bryanston CC) 9 (9] Dylan Kayne (Pearl Valley Golf Estate] 10 (10) Janko van der Merwe (Magaliespark CC] 11 (11) Fabrizio de Abreu (Woodhill CC) 12 (13) Joshua Koekemoer (Silver Lakes CC] 13 (14) Timothy Daniels (Devonvale Golf Estate] 14 (12) Jordan Wessels (Mooinooi GC) 15 (15) Marno Lange (Serengeti Golf and Wildlife Estate] 16 (18) Astin Wade Arthur (Umhlali CC) 17 (17] Jack Brugman (Strand GC) 18 (16) Christopher Bagnall (State…

SEPTEMBER BMW PGA CHAMPIONSHIP 8-11 SEPTEMBER 2021 revisited: American Billy Horschel birdied the 18th hole to claim the BMW PGA Championship title in a tense finish to a tournament with huge implications for Europe’s Ryder Cup team. Horschel was tied for first in a group on – 18 as he stood over his third shot at the par-five 18th at Wentworth but produced a sensational wedge for a nailed-on birdie to complete a sizzling round of seven-under 65. With Horschel in the clubhouse, Englishman Laurie Canter needed to find a birdie at the last to force a playoff but was unable to do so and ended in a tie for second alongside Welshman Jamie Donaldson and Thailand’s Kiradech Aphibamrat who shot a superb closing 64. Horschel, whose bag sports the…

After surprising myself with a tie for 14th in the Zimbabwe Open, I have entered every Sunshine Tour event on the schedule, in the hope of playing well enough to regain my fully exempt status. With that said, I am under no illusion as to how tough it is to compete with this new crop of young guns, especially looking down the barrel of 40.1 haven’t played competitively in over two years, so it’s safe to say that an uphill battle awaits. Since the Zim Open, the stats read: Played 6. Cuts made 3. Cuts missed 3. All three cuts I missed were despite being positioned inside the top 10 going into the second day, with opening rounds of 68, 68 and 66. The three cuts I made were all…

As darkness closed in, Ashleigh Buhai stood over her putt to win the Women’s Open Championship. A putt for birdie, 30 feet from the hole. She’d been here many times before. Not literally, of course. Not at Muirfield and not at the actual British Open. But in her mind, as a kid. Buhai missed the putt, with her ball finishing inches away after looking more likely to drop than stay above ground. One hole later she sealed the deal, becoming South Africa’s first Major champion in 10 years after Ernie Els won the 2012 Open at Royal Lytham & St Annes. She says her life changed the moment she putted in on the fourth extra playoff hole, the 18th, to beat three-time Major champion In-gee Chun. ‘It’s weird how the…

When did you decide to turn pro? I made the decision about a year ago to not go to college and at the time I decided to focus on golf. The plan was to work my way up through the Tours. This summer I went to Europe and the US and gained a lot of experience and I played The Open qualifier against some of the DP World Tour pros. I feel I competed really well over there and almost qualified for The Open at the Old Course at St Andrews. I felt my game needed to be ready before I went pro and this summer has helped a lot. I gained a lot of experience playing in the US and Europe. I feel like my game is now ready…

Many of the scorability actions you do on a golf course have nothing to do with the act of swinging a club. What You’re eating and drinking as you play has a hugely influential impact on your ability to perform on the course. Many amateur golfers who I work with don’t care much about what they put into their bodies when playing golf. The halfway house is full of sugary treats and high-carbohydrate foods, so that’s what they tended to eat. A lot of them would gulp down an energy drink whenever they were thirsty. Fuelling with high-sugar foods and beverages ultimately results in their energy crashing during the latter part of their rounds. One of the biggest inhibitors to golfing performance is dehydration. On an average day, your body…

The Cotswold Downs estate is on the outskirts of Hillcrest in the mist belt some 600m above sea level. Top course designer Peter Matkovich created a stunning USGA-rated championship course across valleys and streams, superbly blending it in with all the natural surroundings. It opened in November 2006. From the usual club tees it is about 250-300m longer than most of the top South Coast courses when they are played from the tips And the championship tees at Cotswold add another 500m on to those distances, At a cumulative 6 700m from the tips (to the front of each green], add an average of 20m to the middle of each green and you are looking at more than 7km of course The course rating reflects its difficulty too, at 75.5.…

If there was such a thing as a revolutionary fairway wood, a claim could be made for the Nike Ignite T60. This was the club that finally got Tiger Woods to ditch his beloved Titleist PT and into something with some modern technology. The Nike T60 followed the T40 by adding an additional 20g of Tungsten equalling 60 total grams of tungsten in the sole of the club to create a Low-spinning, fast fairway wood. It was a deeper-faced design that offered a lot of workability and had a 455 carpenter steel face to do everything it could to push ball speeds. Fairway woods are fighting a battle for survival, at least among the less-talented of the amateurs. their troubles began when Stan Thompson came up with the idea of…

Spain’s Ignacio Garrido birdied the first extra hole in a sudden-death playoff with South African Trevor Immelman to win Europe’s flagship event, the Volvo PGA Championship, Immelman three-putted the 18th at Wentworth, the first playoff hole, to hand the S673 000 (then about RS-milhon) first prize to the Spaniard. Both had finished on 18-under-par 270, three shots better than Swede Mathias Granberg and four ahead of South Africa’s Ernie Els. Immelman. leading overnight, had birdied the last two holes to force the playoff but in the end conceded to Garrido, who took over on top of the leaderboard at the 11th and went on to post a seven-under-par 6S to Immelman’s 68. The playoff began on the par-five 18th. Immelman reached the green in two while Garrido’s second shot clattered…

There’s a reason golf club manufacturers invest so much time working on improving the aerodynamics of their clubs and try to make them lighter. It’s the same reason players like Bryson DeChambeau spend so much time bulking up and working on their flexibility. It’s all about increasing your swing speed for incremental distance gains on the golf course. But what exactly is a reasonable swing speed? The average male Tour professional swings the club at around 114 miles per hour, which equates to a carry distance of around 270 metres. On the women’s side, the average LPGA Tour player’s swing speed is much lower, at 94mph. Interestingly, this is also around the same speed as the average male amateur golfer – and equates to a carry distance of around 225…

One of the most common questions I get is, ‘When is the right time to turn pro?’ and the short answer is there is no definite ‘right time’. However, I have been able to identify a few things that one should consider when faced with that decision. The biggest thing that a player needs is opportunity-Without opportunity, you’re on a very long road to your goal. Opportunity comes in many forms these days. This can come in the form of tournament invitations, sponsorship and management. Having tournaments to play is always the No 1 priority. It doesn’t help if you’re a professional with no tournaments to play. While the IGT and Bushveld Tours are fantastic places to develop, they’re definitely stepping stones to bigger Tours around the world. With the…

Where he sits in his hotel room in Wales with a new moustache and a wave of unruly hair, Brandon Stone looks as comfortable with himself as ever. It’s as if the young man who turned pro almost a decade ago and has flown through five professional victories, an Olympic Games debut and appearances at the Majors in a blur has only now let out a long slow breath. And it comes at a significant time in his life. Perhaps, he feels, it could be the most significant of his entire career. ‘It’s frightening and at the same time fascinating,’ Stone says of this moment in his life and career. A moment where he’s taking the time to think about what comes next, especially with his 30th birthday on the…

Heinrich Bruiners said it best in a tweet at the end of the 2021-22 season when he finished 44th on the Sunshine Tour’s Luno Order of Merit with career record earnings. ‘Worked my ass off this season.’ Never a truer word was tweeted. The George professional has indeed been on a relentless path to self-improvement – in the gym, on the driving range and on the sports psychologist’s couch. At the Vodacom Origins of Golf at De Zalze Golf Club near Stellenbosch, Bruiners took the opportunity to visit vision specialist Dr Sherylle Calder, whose EyeGym technique transformed the careers of Ernie Els and Branden Grace, among a host of sportsmen and women. The man who probably knows more about the golf swing than any other professional on the Sunshine Tour…

The Open at St Andrews this year marked the 150th edition and it was indeed a momentous occasion. St Andrews is considered the Home of Golf and the whole town just oozed this sentiment throughout the week. In a town where no one glances at you twice if you walk around in full golf kit with a bag on your back golf fans were out in force. The R&A invites referees from across the world to attend the championship as part of the Rules Committee, and I was very fortunate to be able to attend this year. The best part of the week for me was being able to walk the course each day with a group of players and you feel like you are walking in the footsteps of…

7th hole. 156m, par three This short hole is one of the most picturesque in the country. In fact, the panoramic view from the club tee is even better than that from the championship tee. The tee is perched on the edge of the cliff – top overlooking the valley, with the green about 60-70m below While the distance from the club tee is 156m. the hole plays about three clubs less. So whatever you are comfortable hitting a distance of 136m. that’s the club you need to find the middle of the huge oval green. When the pin is in the bowl at the back, take an extra club and you should be spot on The bank at the back is a useful backstop and will bring the ball…

Gabbi Venter produced the goods when it counted, pulling off a miraculous approach shot to set up an eagle on Sun City’s par-five 9th hole to win the Nomads SA Girls Championship in a playoff. Having finished the 54-hole tournament tied with Central Gauteng’s Sam Whateley, Venter took on the iconic island green with her second shot and almost holed out for an albatross. ‘Sam laid up with her second and I knew I had to go for it,’ she said. ‘I had 174m to the green – it was a blind shot because the pin was on the left behind the trees, but I felt confident about it. I flushed it and I started running. I could hear the people shouting and I saw the ball bounce right next…

In-Gee Chun belts one of the drives of the day down the right-hand side of the fairway, drawing it gently back into the centre. Over to Ashleigh Buhai, who responds by smoothly arrowing her tee shot down the middle. With Buhai 15 yards longer, Chun will have the opportunity to go first. Chun sends her fairway wood shot into the bunker guarding the right-hand side of the green. Buhai squints into the sun. That’s a wonderful shot, sent sailing into the front of the green. She will have a long look at birdie. Chun has a downhill lie in the bunker, and she’s got to get up and over a grassy island in the middle of the trap. She smiles as she lands her ball 20 feet short, with it…

It was during Stefan Wears-Taylor’s brilliant third-round eight-under-par 64 at Zebula in March, when ‘it’ dawned on him. That was his lowest round as a professional, though, and it put him into contention. His closing one-under 71 took him to a share of 12th, but it was during that round where something clicked for the lanky 26-year-old. ‘I learned a lot about myself on the back nine that Sunday,’ he says. ’I wasn’t very happy about the way I showed my emotions later on during the round. But I feel it was necessary. I experienced massive growth as a person and a golfer. I am grateful for that week and what it did for my game, it showed me that I can compete in the professional ranks and with continued…

A mighty tree has fallen at the unassuming golf course that I call home. It had been dead for several years already, but the decision to turn it into firewood still came as a shock to the system. It was, you see, one of those trees that golfers love to hate, standing as it did, not on the edge of the fairway, but some five metres into it. It was a tree that fulfilled multiple functions. It marked the line that a good drive should take, encouraging the golfer to stay away from all the trouble down the right, and thereby opening up the gentle dogleg for a clear view of the green. Its real purpose, however, was to get in the way of the second shot. Ah, the second…