JOHANNESBURG - The R691 900 that Brandon Stone earned for a share of fourth place in the Joburg Open at Royal Johannesburg & Kensington on Sunday only confirmed what was clear before the start of the tournament - that he has won the 2016 Sunshine Tour Order of Merit, which ends this week with the Tshwane Open.
The hugely gifted 23-year-old has banked a whopping R7 384888, and even though he is not playing the Pretoria Country Club event beginning on Thursday, he cannot be caught by second-placed Dean Burmester, who has picked up a little over R3.34m.
“Winning the Order of Merit is massive and something I’ve always dreamed about since I was just a little guy watching my dad (Kevin Stone) playing on the Sunshine Tour,” said Stone. “It’s a great honour to achieve what great players like Ernie Els, Retief Goosen and Charl Schwartzel have achieved before me.
“This past year has been massive for me, winning the SA Open and the Alfred Dunhill Championship, and playing in two Majors and the Olympics.
"Topping the Order of Merit opens a lot of doors, and now I’m in The Open and the WGC (World Golf Championship) events.”
On that note, Stone left for Mexico on Sunday night where he will take part in this week’s WGC-Mexican Championship, with it’s massive $9,75m purse (that’s about R120m) and no cut.
Branden Grace. Louis Oosthuizen, Charl Schwartzel and Richard Sterne are the other South Africans in the 74-man line-up, which includes every one of the top 50 players in the world.
And the top five in the rankings are Dustin Johnson, Jason Day, Rory McIlroy, Henrik Stenson and Hideki Matsuyama - and Stone says he can’t wait to pit his skills against them all.
“I would have loved to have won the Joburg Open and I came close. My game wasn’t all there but I did play some nice golf (he shot 70-65-67 to finish two back off winner Darren Fichardt), and I feel I’ve gained some momentum for Mexico.
“I’ve never been there before but I’m told the Chapultepec Golf Club, where we’re going to play, is 500 metres higher above sea level than Joburg, which we consider to be at altitude and where the ball flies a long way.
"So, Mexico is going to be crazy long. Bring on the tacos!”
Fichardt, meanwhile, had a chuckle after the last putt had dropped and he was able to reflect on his first European Tour victory since his Africa Open triumph in 2013.
“I had about a two-and-a-half footer for birdie for the win but it was a little downhill with a bit of a break and I was feeling a little tense because under the circumstances it was no gimme.
"So, I called my caddie over, but I noticed he wasn’t too keen to come and help me!” laughed Fichardt.
“I have a new putter and a new claw putting grip, and I wasn’t sure what a bad putt would do under those circumstances. I was just glad that I had chipped it close enough. Actually, I just needed him there so I could blow off a little of the pressure.
“But, geez man, it’s good to win again. The form up until now hasn’t been the best, especially the chipping and putting, but I decided at the beginning of the year that I was going to play as many tournaments as I can and just get my game right.
"And it’s worked out,” added the 41-year-old, the oldest player to win the Joburg Open in its 11 editions.
“I’ve got a new swing-thought that I use on my chipping, and it certainly came in useful(on Sunday),” he said.
“I was surprisingly calm over the one on 18, especially after I bogeyed 17, but it certainly proved to me again that the short game and putting is where you score.”
That scoring gave him his 15th Sunshine Tour title, his fifth European Tour win and his European Tour card is secure until the end of 2018.