The inaugural SDC Championship has drawn a strong selection of the most in-form players on the Sunshine Tour and DP World Tour for the $1.5 million tournament at St Francis Links from 16-19 March.
On the latest list of entries for this event, the Sunshine Tour’s stars include nine out of the top 10 on the current Luno Order of Merit, with four out of the top five players having won locally or internationally in the last three months.
The DP World Tour players include 12 out of the top 30 on the current Race to Dubai Rankings, with five of the last 11 winners in the DP World Tour’s current season. South Africa’s Ockie Strydom will tee it up as a two-time winner on the DP World Tour this season already and who is ranked first on the Luno Order of Merit and fifth on the Race to Dubai Rankings.
The field in St Francis will also include six out of the current top 10 on the European Challenge Tour’s Road to Mallorca Rankings, including every single winner on the tour this season.
Holywood star Tom McKibbin is currently Ireland’s only entry with Gary Hurley and John Murphy on the reserve list. McKibbin sits inside the top-80 on the Race to Dubai having enjoyed a career-best T12 finish in Singapore last month.
Every winner of either a Sunshine Tour and DP World Tour co-sanctioned tournament, or a Sunshine Tour and Challenge Tour co-sanctioned tournament since November 2022 will tee it up, namely Dan Bradbury (Joburg Open), Thriston Lawrence (Investec South African Open), Ockie Strydom (Alfred Dunhill Championship), Antoine Rozner (AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open), Benjamin Follett-Smith (Bain’s Whisky Cape Town Open), Oliver Bekker (Dimension Data Pro-Am), JJ Senekal (SDC Open) and Dylan Mostert (Nelson Mandela Bay Championship).
This will be the first time that St Francis Links hosts a tournament of this magnitude, which is also one of the biggest sporting events for the region.
The SDC Championship enhances the Skills Development Corporation’s (SDC) already strong presence in golf through the SDC Open on the Challenge tour, and this new elevated tournament makes it one of six tournaments on the DP World Tour’s schedule in South Africa.
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