Alfred Dunhill Champs gets go-ahead for last week of November

Since Sweden’s Anton Karlsson won the Cape Town Open, co-sanctioned with the Challenge Tour, in February there has been a dearth of international golf action in South Africa, but that will all change next month with the Alfred Dunhill Championship at Leopard Creek confirmed for November 26-29, hot on the heels of the Joburg Open at Randpark which was announced on Tuesday for the weekend before.

And the South African Open is being launched in Sandton on Thursday and looks set to be played at Sun City from December 3-6. That would give the country three successive weeks of European Tour co-sanctioned action, a fantastic coup for the Sunshine Tour.

The Alfred Dunhill Championship will be the most lucrative of them all, with an increased prize pool of R29 million also announced on Wednesday, which works out as almost €1.5 million, which should be a good incentive for overseas golfers to fly over and maybe spend three weeks in South Africa. The average prize fund for most European Tour events this year has been €1-million.

“The Alfred Dunhill Championship is one of our flagship tournaments and we are extremely grateful to be able to announce it as part of our schedule, and with such a significant increase in prizemoney. I would like to thank our chairman, Johann Rupert, for his unflinching support of our efforts to restart our tour, and for Alfred Dunhill’s long-standing support of professional golf in South Africa,” Thomas Abt, the Commissioner of the Sunshine Tour, said in a statement on Wednesday.

Leopard Creek, which has hosted the Alfred Dunhill Championship since 2004, is situated just outside the town of Malelane, on the southern border of the Kruger National Park, and it is one of the most prestigious, unique courses in the country.

Former Masters champion Charl Schwartzel has won there four times, while other winners include Ernie Els, Branden Grace and Brandon Stone. International star Pablo Larrazabal of Spain won the Alfred Dunhill Championship last year in dramatic fashion on the banks of the Crocodile River

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