Top Zimbabwean professional golfer Brendon de Jonge enjoyed a strong start to the 2012 PGA season after finishing in the top ten in his first outing of the year at the $5,5 million Sony Open in Hawaii.
The 31-year-old golfer finished his final round with a one-over-par 71 which left him nine-under-par for the tournament and tied for 10th position with Canadas David Hearn.
For finishing on number 10 De Jonge, the only Zimbabwean plying his trade on the PGA Tour, pocketed a cool $137 500 and in the process moved to number 21 on the Fedex Cup standings.
De Jonge had gone into Sundays final round which teed off in the early hours of yesterday morning (Zimbabwean time) trailing Americans Matt Every and Jeff Maggert, who were on 12-under par, by two shots.
In the end he finished four shots behind winner Johnson Wagner, who ended the day at three-under-par, 67 and 13-under-par for the tournament.
Although De Jonge was made to wait a little longer for his first PGA Tour win, he left a good impression with his second round 62 which was just two strokes shy of tying the tournament record of 60 by Davis Love III in 1994.
On Saturday, he continued with the same rich vein of form as he birdied the last two holes for a 67, but his identical scores of 71 for the first and final rounds cost him dearly as he could not keep up with the leaders.
Next up for De Jonge is the $5,6 million Human challenge in Partnership with the Clinton Foundation at PGA West (Palmer Course) in LaQuinta, California. The first round begins on Thursday.
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De Jonge has been the countrys leading professional on the PGA Tour and earned an impressive $1 241 326 last season.
In 2008, De Jonge was voted the Nationwide Tours Player of the Year, a tour which is a tier behind the PGA Tour. In his 91 Tour starts since then, hes had 14 top-10 finishes.
Although hes given himself chances to win on several occasions at the 2010 Viking Classic, he was the co-leader through the first 36 holes and tied for second entering the final round before finishing tied for third he has yet to seal the deal.
In November last year De Jonge and Bruce McDonald combined to lead Zimbabwe to an impressive 11th place at the 28-team Golf World Cup in Hainan, China and in so doing became the highest ranked African country at the event.
