Prinsloo wins Joburg City Masters

Jaco Prinsloo carded a four-under-par 68 final round at the Joburg City Masters at Country Club Johannesburg on Thursday, to total 12-under-par and win his first Big Easy Tour event since 2013.

“I won a Big Easy event in 2013 or 2014 – I’m not sure – in Kempton Park. It’s been a while since I won on the Big Easy,” he said after his win, “but, it’s very nice to win the co-sanctioned event with the MENA Tour. It just feels like it’s a step higher.”

Prinsloo came into final round one shot back of Jamie Elson who was on nine-under. He quickly took the lead while Elson fell back and Omar Sandys was making upward movement on the leaderboard.

“The last leaderboard was on hole number 15’s green,” Prinsloo said of the pressure that was being applied by the chasing pack, “and, I still had a three-shot lead there. And I thought ‘OK, this looks pretty simple’, and all of a sudden on 17, Omar (Sandys) was on 10-under and put some pressure on me. But luckily I kept calm and put the ball in the right spaces, and yeah got it done.”

The change of mindset he spoke about earlier in the tournament seems to have stood him in good stead in Johannesburg, as Sandys really looked like he would snatch it underneath Prinsloo’s nose.

“Well, I just had to keep doing the things I have done the last two days,” he said, “and, it’s always a little bit tougher to do that on the last day; a little bit more pressure. But, I managed to and kept calm and that got the trick done here.”

Member of the Gary Player Class of 2017-18, Sandys, fell two shots adrift of Prinsloo, while fellow squad member in that development programme, Jacquin Hess, settled for a shared third with Jeff Inglis of England and Francois Coetzee, on seven-under.