ZIMBABWE-BORN golfer Dean Burmester continued his dream season on the Sunshine Tour after cruising to his fourth win of the year with a five-shot victory at the Vodacom Origins of Golf event at Koro Creek Golf Estate in Limpopo, South Africa, on Saturday.
BY DANIEL NHAKANISO
The 26-year-old Mutare-born golfer closed with a five-under-par round of 67 to finish five shots clear of South African Vaughn Groenewald on 19-under-par 197 and claim the R103 025 winners’ cheque.
With the win, Burmester, who is the son of former Zimbabwe Test cricketer Mark Burmester, strengthened his growing status as one of the continent’s brightest golfing prospects.
“I can’t really put it into words,” he told sunshinetour.com. “To be standing here with four wins and leading the Chase to the Investec Cup is difficult to get my head around.
“It’s been a special year. I got married last November, settled down with the wife and we had our first child. My family moved back to South Africa a couple of years ago. So they’re a phone call away and I had my dad on the bag this week. So the support has been endless.”
The big-hitting Burmester attributed his brilliant perfomance in the final round to his ball striking, which led to plenty of birdie opportunities.
“My iron play was pretty good today and I found myself hitting a lot of them close. I controlled my ball flight well and got a lot of yardages right. So I was really happy with that.
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Since clinching his first win of the season at the Golden Pilsener Zimbabwe Open held at Royal Harare Golf Club in April, Burmester has gone on to win a further three titles on Southern Africa’s premier professional golf tour.
The Bloemfontein-based golfer triumphed at the Lombard Insurance Classic in Swaziland a month later, before clinching the Sun Windmill Challenge trophy last month.
In addition to the four victories this season, he boasts of a further eight top-10 finishes on tour this season.
Although Burmester currently plays under the South African flag, he has already indicated his desire to retrace his Zimbabwean roots with the hope of playing at next year’s Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro.
“Playing for Zimbabwe at the Olympics in 2016 with Brendon de Jonge would be a massive achievement for me,” he said recently.
“He (De Jonge) would obviously be the other golfer, but you never know. It’s still a long way away, but I’ll definitely give it my all and it will definitely be under the Zimbabwe flag,” Burmester said.
