It seems scarcely believable, but Frenchman Noa Auch-Roy almost lapped the field on Thursday in the gruelling 36-hole finale to the South African Amateur Stroke Play Championship at Mossel Bay Golf Club.
Play was delayed by an hour in the morning after two or three hours of torrential rain, and the first games in the morning field from both the 1st and 10th tees went off in light rain. That gradually cleared up, and Auch-Roy was quick to take advantage of cool temperatures and a gentle breeze to tame the course and obliterate his opponents.
The man who turns 19 in three days gave himself an early birthday present with a six-under-par 66 in the morning, and a seven-under-par 65 in the afternoon to reach a superb 23-under-par total for the 72 holes.
Augh-Roy became the fourth player from his country in the last 10 years to win the title, and he did so with a staggering nine-stroke winning margin over runners-up Sean Paxton and Logan Leisher.
He followed in the footsteps of Ugo Coussaud, who won in Port Elizabeth in 2013, Edgar Catherine, the winner at Kingswood in 2017, and Martin Couvra who pulled off the feat at Mount Edgecombe in 2023.
“I am so happy with this win,” said the delighted Frenchman. “I won last week and now I’ve won the big one.
“When Martin won, he went on to the DP World Tour, so it’s great to come out here in our winter. I played three tournaments last year and again this year. The courses are great, and the tournaments are big. I love coming out to South Africa.”
A member of the Renaud Gris Golf Institute academy in Mionnay, Lyon, Augh-Roy played in just two events in South Africa this year ahead of this triumph: he came 34th in the GolfRSA International at Royal Johannesburg, and then he sealed his first victory of the season in the Cape Province Open at George Golf Club and Kingswood Golf by a single shot.
The Frenchman dropped just four shots the whole week in Mossel Bay after opening with a bogey-free 67 in the first round. He made two bogeys in a row in the second round and gave up just one stroke to par on each of the 18 he played in the final round.
He made bogey on nine in the morning round, but he’d already picked up two birdies at that stage. After the turn, he ignited the afterburners, and he came home in 31 blows with five birdies.
In the afternoon, he dropped a shot on the 3rd hole, but that was in the middle of five birdies through the 6th hole. He turned in 32 and then came home in 33 with three birdies on the back nine.
“I hit a bad shot out of the bunker on the 3rd, but I came back with two birdies, and when I turned, I didn’t really have any stress. The course is not very long for me, so my strategy was to hit a lot of drivers, wedges in and to give myself chances for birdies,” Augh-Roy explained. “It worked really well for me. And the putter was very hot this week.”
By the time he was headed for home, things had become rather academic: Paxton, despite the fact that he, too, had just one bogey in each of his final two rounds, found that his two-under 70 and his four-under 68 were somewhat inadequate as a riposte to the brilliance of the Frenchman.
So, too Leisher’s pair of 70s to close, although his card was spotted with three bogeys in the morning and a bogey and a double in the afternoon.
There were four players in a share of fourth on 13 under par: Gregor Tait of Scotland had a 66 in the morning to get within five of Auch-Roy, and he closed with a two-under-par 70 to finish up 10 off the pace.
South Africans Riaan Kotze and Jordan Wessels, who led the first two rounds, were also on 13 under after they each went seven under in the final two rounds with a 68 and a 69 each.
The fourth player on 13 under was India’s Kartik Singh, who also closed with a 69 and a 68.
Fortunately for the rest of the competitors heading to the South African Amateur Championship next, it will be open season for the most prized piece of silverware on the GolfRSA national circuit as Augh-Roy is heading to Spain, and will not be trying emulate his countryman Couvra.
The SA Amateur tees off with a 36-hole qualifier at Humewood Golf Club on Sunday, with the top 64 advancing to the match play stage.
Photo: GolfRSA
