With the establishment of the Africa Amateur Championship, the inaugural edition of which is being staged this week at Leopard Creek Country Club in South Africa, the R&A continues its crusade to grow golf around the world. Much as it has done with the Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship (in partnership with the Masters Tournament) and the Latin America Amateur (with the Masters and the USGA), the St. Andrews-based organization is once again trying to raise ambitions and create opportunities for competitive players in an outpost of the golf world while developing heroes who might help to draw youngsters to the sport.
The 2024 Africa Amateur, which began Wednesday, features 72 men from 24 countries in a 72-hole tournament. The field will be cut to 40 after 36 holes, with the winner receiving exemptions in this year’s Open and Amateur Championships as well as the Alfred Dunhill Championship, which is also staged at Leopard Creek and part of the DP World Tour.
At the same time, the R&A is debuting the Africa Amateur Women’s Invitational at Leopard Creek, a wild and wonderful retreat that billionaire businessman Johann Rupert established in 1997 on the border of Kruger Park – a game preserve where crocodiles, hippos, elephants, antelopes and Cape buffalo roam.
A 54-hole tourney that is being held at the same venue, it brings together 20 of the best female golfers on the continent. In this case, the winner will earn starts in the Women’s Amateur Championship and the Investec South African Women’s Open in 2024 as well as the Final Qualifying for the AIG Women’s Open.
According to R&A officials, broadcasts of both events will reach more than 170 million homes in roughly 70 countries around the world.
“The creation of the Africa Amateur Championship and Africa Amateur Women’s Invitational reflects our commitment to fostering talent, creating a pathway for aspiring golfers and elevating the standard of amateur golf in the region,” said Phil Anderton, chief development officer at the R&A. “We want to replicate the success we’ve achieved in Asia-Pacific and Latin America, where our international events for both men and women have become proven platforms for discovering future stars of the sport. A number of these talented golfers have gone on to become major champions and be successful on the professional tours, inspiring others to pursue their ambitions in golf.”
Christiaan Maas, a 20-year-old from the South African capital of Pretoria, is the leading player in the men’s field based on being 13th on the World Amateur Golf Ranking. And he, too, believes the tournament will do a lot to bolster the game in this part of the planet.
“I think [it] will inspire more young people to play golf and achieve the dream of playing in this special event,” said Maas, who is a sophomore on the University of Texas golf team and was runner-up at the 2023 Western Amateur. “It will make them want to get their game to as good a level as it can be so they can compete at Leopard Creek and maybe play in the Open. That’s definitely my goal.”
According to R&A CEO Martin Slumbers, the creation of these two tournaments is a natural progression.
“We have been very keen to build and promote pathways for elite golfers,” he told Global Golf Post from Leopard Creek. “But the one region we had not yet gone to was Africa. We have been thinking the past few years of going there, especially with the success of young South African golfers,” he said, noting reigning British Amateur champion Christo Lamprecht, who is No. 2 in the WAGR, and Maas. “We have also been aware of the development of very good players in Morocco and Kenya.”
Slumbers says the process accelerated in the fall of 2022 when he sat down for a talk with Rupert, the South African-born chairman of the Swiss-based luxury goods company Richemont (which counts Dunhill as one of its brands) and an ardent backer of amateur golf in his homeland.
“I told him what we wanted to do with both tournaments and said that we needed his help,” Slumbers said. “One, we hoped to hold these events at Leopard Creek, which he founded and which is one of the premier golf clubs in the world. And second, we wondered if he might introduce us to potential sponsors.”
Starting these tournaments makes sense on a number of levels. For one thing, the R&A governs golf in every country and territory outside the U.S. and Mexico, a realm that includes some 61 million golfers in 145 countries. So, Africa is very much in its purview.
Slumbers, who describes Rupert as a “committed and passionate partner,” says he stepped up big-time.
Starting these tournaments makes sense on a number of levels. For one thing, the R&A governs golf in every country and territory outside the U.S. and Mexico, a realm that includes some 61 million golfers in 145 countries. So, Africa is very much in its purview.
It is also a place where the game is starting to take hold, with the R&A estimating that 5.3 million adults engage with golf across all formats on the continent. The number of registered golfers there has been growing as well, especially among juniors and women. In addition, Africa has been producing some talented players who are making their marks at young ages. For example, the last two winners of the Amateur Championships – Lamprecht and Aldrich Potgieter – hail from South Africa as did 2018 victor Jovan Rebula. And after turning pro in 2022, now-26-year-old Ines Laklalech of Morocco has not only won on the Ladies European Tour but also earned her LPGA Tour card.
To be sure, those are promising developments. But with fewer than half of the 54 countries in Africa having players in the maiden editions of the new amateur competitions, it is clear that much work needs to be done to build the game there.
“What we are seeing is that at the top end, amateur golf in Africa is very good and more or less the equivalent of what we found in the Asia-Pacific region at the beginning of the Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship,” Slumbers said. “But the bottom half in comparison is a long way. Our plan is to use the Africa events in conjunction with other grow-the-game programs we are working on across the region and create a whole new ecosystem for the game across the entire region.”
As was the case in its other grow-the-game endeavors, the R&A has enjoyed lots of support in creating these new Africa amateur events, Rupert chief among them.
Slumbers says that he has consulted with his colleagues at the Masters and the USGA about the R&A’s Africa initiative. “Just because they are not formally part of these championships does not mean we don’t seek their help and advice on them,” he said. “We all share the same objectives.”
Another benefactor is Rolex, which has long backed the R&A efforts in developing golf around the world and is an event partner for these competitions.
Slumbers says that he has consulted with his colleagues at the Masters and the USGA about the R&A’s Africa initiative. “Just because they are not formally part of these championships does not mean we don’t seek their help and advice on them,” he said. “We all share the same objectives.”
As for what happens going forward, Slumbers expects the Africa Amateur and the Africa Amateur Women’s Invitational to be staged around this same time of year in the future. “We want to make sure we have the best possible fields, and this timing seems to work with the college golf schedules,” he said.
Leopard Creek will host the event for the next three years, Slumbers said. “We see it as an anchor site that will help us establish the championships and build their profile as we create excitement around them.”
It’s an exciting development for golf in Africa.