13 February 2025 – 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 first 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 third hole, but that was in the middle of five birdies through the sixth 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 third, 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: Frenchman Noa Augh-Roy roared to a nine-stroke victory on 23-under-par 265 in the South African Stroke Play Championship, courtesy of rounds of 66 and 65 on the final day of the GolfRSA flagship event at Mossel Bay Golf Club; credit GolfRSA.
Final result of the 2025 GolfRSA South African Stroke Play Championship at Mossel Bay Golf Club (par 72) on 13 February all competitors RSA unless otherwise indicated:
265 Noa Auch-Roy FRA 67 67 66 65
274 Sean Paxton 71 65 70 68; Logan Leisher 67 67 70 70
275 Gregor Tait SCO 66 73 66 70; Riaan Kotze 67 71 68 69; Kartik Singh IND 70 68 69 68; Jordan Wessels 64 67 73 71
276 Octave Bailo FRA 69 71 69 67; Harry Watkins WAL 73 65 69 69
278 Morris Schiefner GER 71 72 70 65; Charl Barnard 71 73 69 65; Juan Barnard 70 68 69 71
279 Jack McDonald SCO 70 71 68 70; Johndre Ludick 69 70 72 68; Ethan Govender 69 76 67 67
280 Shaun Viljoen 71 66 73 70; Christiaan Heyman 70 67 74 69
281 Roelof Craig 69 70 70 72
282 Jordan Burnand 70 71 74 67
283 Cameron Mukherjee SCO 73 70 71 69; Daniel Copeman 70 68 72 73; Damian Osner 72 66 73 72; Janko van der Merwe 70 68 75 70; Joshua Edwards 73 73 67 70; Ivan Verster 74 72 69 68
284 Bradley de Beer 74 68 70 72; Gerard Hartman 69 69 73 73
285 Andrew Georgiou 73 70 70 72; Jamie Mann SCO 68 72 72 73; Dian Kruger 70 70 71 74; Liam McKenna 73 71 69 72
287 Max Hopkins ENG 70 72 75 70; Timothy Daniels 73 70 72 72; Ben Willis ENG 72 71 72 72; Michael Wallace ZIM 68 76 74 69; Vuyisani Makama 68 69 79 71
288 Nelis de Bruin 66 76 74 72; Arin Ahuja IND 72 70 78 68; Henru Walters 73 68 74 73; Jeré Brits 72 73 72 71; Juan Coetzee 76 70 72 70
289 Wandre Snyman 70 72 73 74; Keegan Daws 69 71 77 72
291 Benjamin Weber 71 72 76 72
291 Nathan Schuldt 70 74 72 75; Amicus de Beer 72 74 75 70
292 Ruben-Hein Churr 70 73 75 74; Matthew Mortimer 73 70 75 74; Joshua Wiese 69 71 78 74; Matthew Dennis 73 71 71 77; Dujuan Snyman 70 75 76 71
293 Rakshit Dahiya IND 69 71 81 72
294 Louka Morin FRA 70 74 76 74; Nicholas Lewis 70 75 76 73
295 Devon Valentine 73 72 77 73; Lourens Maritz 72 73 77 73; Santiago do Santos 74 72 76 73
296 Kass Muller 73 70 75 78
297 Samuel Gouws 70 71 75 81; Werner Potgieter 70 73 77 77; Abdul Malik Ebrahim 76 68 80 73; Hannes Conradie 81 65 77 74
300 Siebert Wiid 72 73 80 75
302 Franco Bester 73 68 80 81
303 Othimna Matiwana 70 75 73 85
