Tomorrow, the fourth and final tournament of the South African leg of the Challenge Tour, the Nelson Mandela Bay Championship, kicks off in Port Elizabeth. The championship is held precisely in the bay that gives the tournament its name. The tournament is played at Hunewood Golf Club, a course next to the water overlooking the Indian Ocean, where the wind usually plays a crucial role. It was so last year and it will be again in this edition.
Five Spaniards will be part of the game this week at Hunewood: Quim Vidal, Víctor Pastor, Javi Sainz who have just played the Dimension Data Pro Am, and Borja Virto and Ángel Ayora who had to rest and train hard last week for what is coming in this last dance in South Africa. Two regulars on the circuit, Lucas Vacarisas and Joel Moscatel will play this week the Magical Kenya Open of the DP World Tour.
If we stick to last year’s table, Javi Sainz and Borja Virto achieved great results. Borja was ninth and Javi made it into the top twenty players of the year. At the start of this year, neither of them has managed to make the cut in as many tournaments as they have played and they are looking to regain those good feelings and start earning points that will take them back to the final of the Road to Mallorca where they already met two seasons ago.
Another big name is Víctor Pastor who comes from two consecutive weeks at a high level, going out on Sunday with chances of victory in both tournaments and with special mention to the third place he achieved last week at Fancourt Golf State. The spotlight is beginning to focus on him and in fact the Challenge Tour points him out as one of the three players to watch out for this week. He is currently ninth in the circuit ranking. Blessed pressure. Last year Víctor failed to make the cut in the tournament, we will see if he can reverse his relationship with Humewood Golf Club.
Ángel Ayora returns to competition with the intention after a week of training in which he will seek to continue growing and maintain the level shown in the first week of the year after a spectacular top 10 in the season debut. The last Spaniard in the fray is Quim Vidal who seeks to close the South African tour with the best feelings and continue climbing positions after the great top 20 achieved a few days ago at Facourt Golf State
No rain is expected in Port Elizabeth this week but from Friday at 12:00 there is a forecast that the wind will go crazy in the vicinity of Hunewood and will not leave until Sunday afternoon. A lot of wind is expected in the tournament from that moment on so perhaps the players who go out in the evening shift tomorrow and morning on Friday may be somewhat benefited. You never know because the currents do not understand schedules and can change at any time. However, on paper only one of ours, Ángel Ayora, would benefit from this shift. Thursday can be a key day.
Hunewood is a total links course, in fact it is known as the “only true links in Africa”. Its designer, Colonel SV Hotchkin, was inspired by the Old Course at St Andrews to create the course. But of course we find a particularity of the site where it is located. The course has much thicker African grass and the ball does not bounce as much or roll the same as on British links. Fewer surprises with the bounces, but you also don’t gain as much distance as perhaps happens in the UK. The greens are expected to be kept relatively slow as we have highlighted a lot of wind is expected at least the last three days. Coming from Fancourt where the greens were at high speed the players will have to adapt as soon as possible to the new circumstances.
South Africa, on the other hand, faces an unusual fact and that is that for the first time they could end the tour of tournaments in their country without any local victory. Very strange fact that has not occurred in these five years of agreement between the European Circuit and the Sunshine Tour, remember that all the tournaments of this tour are co-sanctioned with the South African circuit. We say strange because the peculiarities of playing in Mandela’s land combined with the number of local players invites them to usually take some tournament for the national showcases. Just last year three of the four tournaments were won by South Africans (Oliver Bekker, JJ Senekal and Dylan Mostert) and the remaining title was taken by Benjamin Follet-Smith, a neighbour of the country of Zimbabwe who knows perfectly how to play in these parts.
Hopefully one of ours will make South Africa leave ‘their’ tour empty-handed and give Spain that long-awaited first victory that eludes us in the land of the Mandela factor.
