FOR RELEASE: 19 November 2009
(George, South Africa) – Champions Tour competitors always play a popular role in the Gary Player Invitational presented by Coca-Cola and this year’s event at The Links at Fancourt, George, South Africa from 26-29 November 2009 will include some well-liked draw cards alongside tournament host Gary Player.
Grand Slam winner Gary Player, John Bland, Bertus Smit, Vincent Tshabalala and Bobby Jones will fly the South African flag, while Scotsman Bill Longmuir will add international flavour alongside some Zimbabwean players, who were previously real forces to be reckoned with on the Sunshine Tour.
Mark McNulty, now an Irish citizen, has an enviable record on South African soil, including a sensational year in 1986 when he captured seven Sunshine Tour titles and the Nedbank Challenge at Sun City.
In the same year he finished in the top ten on the European Tour’s Order of Merit for the first time, placing sixth. McNulty was one of the leading players on the European Tour from the mid 1980s to the mid 1990s, and cracked the top 10 of the Official World Golf Rankings for 83 weeks from 1987 to 1992
Since joining the Champions Tour, he has won seven times and, added to his regular Tour victories, McNulty has 61 victories in his career. His first full season in 2004 was highly successful with three wins (including the Charles Schwab Cup Championship) and a seventh place finish on the money list. In 2007 he won the JELD-WEN Tradition, one of the five major championships on the over-50 tour. His seventh win came this year at the Principal Charity Classic with a playoff win over Nick Price and Fred Funk.
Like his countryman, Tony Johnstone has also enjoyed plenty of success in South Africa.
He has won 17 times on the Sunshine Tour, including winning the South African Open twice, and recorded six victories on the European Tour. In 2004 Johnstone was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis and thought he would never play golf again, but a revolutionary drug treatment appears to have put his MS into remission and him back on the golf course.
Johnstone made his European Senior Tour debut shortly after turning 50 in 2006. Two years later he won his first title at the Jersey Seniors Classic and added victory number two at the 2009 Travis Perkins pls Senior Masters.
An accomplished golf broadcaster, Johnstone is also noted for his short game and topped the European Tour’s statistics in this category in 1998, 1999 and 2000.
British golfer Longmuir also brings a fine pedigree into the Gary Player Invitational.
A regular on the European tour for 16 years, Longmuir made the top 90 on the Order of Merit every year from 1976 to 1990, with a best ranking of 24th in 1982. In 1979, Longmuir won the Tooting Bec Cup having shot a 65, the lowest round by a British player in the Open Championship at Royal Lytham.
In 2003, Longmuir joined the senior circuit in Europe, where he has won regularly the last six years.
In his rookie year, he won the De Vere PGA Seniors Championship and Ryder Cup Wales Seniors Open and finished runner-up on that year’s Order of Merit. In 2004 he added the Charles Church Scottish Seniors Open and Mobile Cup to his tally, the Scandinavian Senior Open in 2005 and the Midas English Seniors Open in 2007.
Longmuir triumphed at the 2008 DGM Barbados Open after a scintillating final round at Royal Westmoreland Golf Club. That was the first of seven top five finishes that saw him finish the 2009 season in fifth place on the Order of Merit – his best campaign since 2004.
To date, Longmuir has boasted four top-10 finishes and a current ranking of 33rd in Europe, but he has been splitting his time with the Champions Tour since qualifying in 2006.
Smit clinched his first Senior Tour win at the Ryder Cup Wales Seniors Open after a return trip to Qualifying School last year, having finished just outside the top-50.
The South African, who won more than 100 Open titles as an amateur and represented the Western Province from 1979 to 1994, was also a successful wheat farmer for nearly 30 years, but in 2001, Smit packed it all in to follow his dreams.
He featured prominently on the mini-circuit in the United States, winning the Sunbelt Senior Professional Golf Tour money list in 2002 and 2003. He joined the European Senior Tour in 2005 with a second place at Qualifying School and enjoyed a superb rookie year in 2006, finishing in the top 10 in eight of his 16 starts.
Having played in 2007 as a senior professional and last year, as a business man alongside John Bland, Adilson da Silva and Shaun Pollock, Jones is no stranger to the Gary Player Invitational.
Born in Krugersdorp at the end of the Second World War, Bobby Jones made his entry into golf as a caddie at Bryanston Country Club and by the age of 10, was already a competent golfer. In 1978, he turned professional and competed on the Sunshine Tour for the next decade until he was financially unable to continue life as a touring professional.
Jones, who is also the owner of the Observatory Golf Club driving range and Pro Shop, which he opened over a decade ago, resumed this passion upon entering the senior ranks and currently campaigns on the senior circuit at home.
Tshabalala, one of South African’s greatest black golfers who enjoyed success on both the European & European Senior Tours, is a two-time winner in this event. He won the Betterball competition with Ernie Els in the 2004 Gary Player Invitational and again in 2005, playing with Tim Clark.
Tshabalala, who was not able to play on the Southern African Tour in his prime, gained entry to international tournaments with assistance Player and 1976 he won the European Tour’s French Open. His career was curtailed by injury, but in his comeback in the over-50 ranks, he finished in the top twenty on the European Seniors Tour Order of Merit four times in the 1990s.
Reigning Masters champion Angel Cabrera, double US Open winner Retief Goosen,, as well as Sunshine Tour regulars Omar Sandys and Thomas Aiken are among the eight regular Tour professionals that will tee it up alongside their senior counterparts.
One thing is for certain – over the last 10 years of the Gary Player Invitational it has become clear that the Champions Tour competitors really prove their worth in the tournament. Not only do they anchor the Fourball Alliance teams, but often have to carry their regular Tour partners in the Betterball Medal competition.
Contact:
Tickets are available from Computicket at a cost of R75 each.
For further information, please contact:
Marc Tudhope, Managing Director, Black Knight International
E: marc@garyplayer.co.za or T: +27 21 671 5159
Jo Hone, GPI Event Director, Black Knight International
E: jo@garyplayer.co.za or T: +27 21 671 5159
Jen Fonseca, Program Director for The Player Foundation
E: jen@garyplayer.com or T: +1 561 624 0300
