By Ken Borland
JOHANNESBURG Aug 28 (Reuters) – South Africa will host the
most events on the 2013 European Tour after the Sunshine Tour
announced two new co-sanctioned tournaments on Tuesday.
The Nelson Mandela Championship, to be staged in association
with the former South African president’s Nelson Mandela
Children’s Fund, will be held from Dec. 6-9 and the Tshwane Open
will take place from Feb. 28 to March 3.
The two new events bring to six the number of tournaments to
be played in South Africa in next year’s Race to Dubai.
The Tshwane Open at the Els Club Copperleaf will have
prizemoney of 1.5 million euro ($1.9 million), meaning the
winner will gain a two-year exemption on the European Tour.
The purse for the Nelson Mandela Championship has yet to be
finalised but Sunshine Tour executive director Selwyn Nathan
said it would be “a minimum of one million euro”.
“I’m particularly excited that we have another two European
Tour co-sanctioned events as it shows the confidence one of the
two major tours in the world has in us,” Nathan said.
The venue for the Nelson Mandela Championship has yet to be
finalised but Nathan said it would be held at one of two coastal
courses – the Royal Durban Golf Club or Humewood in Port
Elizabeth in the Eastern Cape.
The Tshwane municipality’s executive mayor, Kgosientso
Ramokgopa, said his council were guaranteeing 44 million rand
($5.24 million) per annum for their tournament until the
Sunshine Tour could find sufficient sponsors.
The Sunshine Tour also announced that the prizemoney for the
Alfred Dunhill Championship, to be played at Leopard Creek from
Dec. 13-16, has been increased to 1.5 million euro.
($1 = 0.7990 euros)
($1 = 8.3920 South African rand)
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