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This article is an incomplete list of sporting events relevant to South Africa in 1959
| | This article does not cite any sources .(November 2012) (Learn how and when to remove this template message) |
This article is an incomplete list of sporting events relevant to South Africa in 1959
The Rugby Championship is an international rugby union competition contested annually by Argentina, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. These are the four highest ranked national teams in the Southern Hemisphere, the Six Nations is a similar tournament in the Northern Hemisphere.
Theodore Ernest Els is a South African professional golfer. A former World No. 1, he is known as "The Big Easy" due to his imposing physical stature along with his fluid golf swing. Among his 71 career victories are four major championships: the U.S. Open in 1994 at Oakmont and in 1997 at Congressional, and The Open Championship in 2002 at Muirfield and in 2012 at Royal Lytham & St Annes. He is one of six golfers to twice win both the U.S. Open and The Open Championship.
Arthur Robert Ashe Jr. was an American professional tennis player who won three Grand Slam singles titles.
Gary Player DMS, OIG is a South African retired professional golfer who is widely considered to be one of the greatest golfers ever. During his career, Player won nine major championships on the regular tour and nine major championships on the Champions Tour. At the age of 29, Player won the 1965 U.S. Open and became the only non-American to win all four majors in a career, known as the career Grand Slam. At the time, he was the youngest player to do this, though Jack Nicklaus (26) and Tiger Woods (24) subsequently broke this record. Player became only the third golfer in history to win the Career Grand Slam, following Ben Hogan and Gene Sarazen, and only Nicklaus and Woods have performed the feat since. He won over 150 professional tournaments on six continents over seven decades and was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame in 1974.
Retief Goosen is a South African professional golfer. He has won two U.S. Opens, in 2001 and 2004, headed the European Tour Order of Merit in 2001 and 2002, and was in the top ten of the world rankings for over 250 weeks between 2001 and 2007. He was elected to the World Golf Hall of Fame, class of 2019.
The South Africa national football team represents South Africa in men's international football and it is governed by the South African Football Association, the governing body for football in South Africa. The team's nickname is Bafana Bafana, and South Africa's home ground is FNB Stadium, which is located in Johannesburg. The team's greatest result was winning the Africa Cup of Nations at home in 1996. The team is a member of both FIFA and Confederation of African Football (CAF).
Arthur D'Arcy "Bobby" Locke was a South African professional golfer. He won four Open Championships, nine South African Opens, seven South African PGA Championships and 15 PGA Tour events. He was a prolific tournament winner in his native country, eventually accumulating 38 wins on the Southern Africa Tour.
The South African Open Championship is one of the oldest national open golf championships in the world, having first been played in 1903, and is one of the principal tournaments on the Southern-Africa-based Sunshine Tour. Since 1997 it has also been co-sanctioned by the European Tour.
Charl Adriaan Schwartzel is a South African professional golfer who plays on the PGA Tour, European Tour, and the Sunshine Tour. He has won one major title, the Masters in 2011. Schwartzel's highest world ranking has been number six, after finishing in a tie for fourth at the WGC-Cadillac Championship in 2012.
Mark William McNulty is an Irish/Zimbabwean professional golfer currently playing on the PGA Tour Champions. He was one of the leading players on the European Tour from the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s, and featured in the top 10 of the Official World Golf Ranking for 83 weeks from 1987 to 1992.
The Triple Crown of Golf is the winning of three major golf championships in the same year. This feat has been accomplished only twice in modern golf history:
Wayne Richard Ferreira is a South African former professional tennis player.
Frew Donald McMillan is a former professional male tennis player from South Africa who won five major doubles championships including three Wimbledons with Bob Hewitt. All together, he won 63 doubles titles, surpassed only by the Bryan brothers, Todd Woodbridge, John McEnroe and Tom Okker. He was also ranked No.1 in Doubles on the ATP Computer for a significant period from 1977 to 1979 when he was aged 37.
Trevor John Immelman is a South African professional golfer who has played on the PGA Tour, European Tour and Sunshine Tour. He won his sole major championship at the 2008 Masters Tournament.
Harold Henning was a South African professional golfer who played on the PGA Tour and the Senior PGA Tour.
Lodewicus Theodorus "Louis" Oosthuizen is a South African professional golfer who won the 2010 Open Championship. He also holds the distinction of finishing runner-up in all four major championships: the 2012 Masters Tournament losing in a sudden death playoff, the 2015 U.S. Open, the 2015 Open Championship where he was defeated in a four-hole aggregate playoff, and the 2017 PGA Championship. He is the eighth golfer to accomplish this feat, joining Craig Wood, Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Tom Watson, Greg Norman, Dustin Johnson and Phil Mickelson. His highest placing on the Official World Golf Ranking is fourth which he reached in January 2013.
Sport in South Africa has a significant role in South African culture. The three most popular mainstream sports in the country, namely, football, rugby, and cricket, reflect its early British colonial influence.
The South African Open – formerly known as the South African Championships, and for sponsorship reasons the Altech NCR South African Open and the Panasonic South African Open – is a defunct Grand Prix Tennis Tour, World Championship Series, ATP Tour and Virginia Slims Circuit affiliated tennis tournament played from 1891 to 2011 in South Africa. It was part of the pre-open era international seasonal tours from 1891 to 1967 from 1968 to 1971, part of the open era independent events tour from 1972, when it became part the men's Grand Prix Tour until 1989. The women's side of the competition was only briefly part of Virginia Slims tour (1970–74) before it returned to the independent circuit.
Branden John Grace is a professional golfer from South Africa who currently plays on the European Tour, the PGA Tour, and the Sunshine Tour. In 2012, he became the first player in the history of the European Tour to win his first four European Tour titles in the same year.