SA golf star Aldrich Potgieter shoots 59 in PGA event in Colombia

South African teenager Aldrich Potgieter shot the second sub-60 score in as many days with a 59 on the second-tier Korn Ferry Tour in Colombia on Friday.

On Thursday, Chile’s Cristobal del Solar fired the record-lowest round in a PGA Tour-sanctioned event on Thursday with a 13-under par 57 in the opening round of the Astara Golf Championship in Bogota, Colombia.

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The 19-year-old Potgieter shot 10 birdies, an eagle and a bogey on the same course to finish 11-under-par at the Country Club de Bogota-Pacos.

Already the youngest winner in Korn Ferry Tour history, Potgieter became the youngest to break 60 in a PGA Tour sanctioned event after making birdies on his final three holes.

Potgieter said that Del Solar’s score had given him the belief he could go very low.

“I was kind of trying to get to that 57, so I was trying to push myself, but then kind of realized that we’re still in a golf tournament, we’re not playing a fun round out here, so I was kind of trying to concentrate when I made those last three birdies, which helped a lot,” he said.

“I knew I had to play well to be able to shoot this low. It was just kind of the confidence to hit the ball, get it close, make putts.”

The course is the shortest on the Korn Ferry Tour at 6,254 yards, and is almost 9,000 feet above sea level but had never seen a sub-60 score before Thursday.

The tournament is being held on two adjacent courses and the South African will be back on the tougher and longer Lagos course on Saturday.

Potgieter won the Amateur Championship in 2022 at Royal Lytham and St Annes and won last month’s Korn Ferry event in the Bahamas.