Aldrich Potgieter

Potgieter was born in South Africa but moved to Australia when he was 8. He lived there for nine years before moving back to South Africa, playing at Pinnacle Point on the southern coast of South Africa so that he could learn how to keep the ball low in the wind. He attends the Louis Oosthuizen Junior Golf Academy.
In the spring of 2022, he won a staggering 20-shot victory in the Nomads South African Boys Under-19 Stroke Play Championship. He then decided to play in the United Kingdom for the first time. He played his first event at the Scottish Men's Open Championship held at Cruden Bay Golf Club and only played two rounds, shooting 79-72. The following week he played in the St. Andrews Links Trophy. He shot 75-71 to miss the cut. But he got his first look at the Old Course.
Two weeks later, it was off to the Amateur Championship, played at Royal Lytham & St. Annes. Potgieter made it to match play easily, shooting 71-69 to finish T-18th in the stroke-play portion. On the way to the finals, Potgieter beat the previous year's runner-up Monty Scowsill 6 & 4, not losing a single hole in the round of 64. His next opponent was Cristoni Matteo. He beat him 3 & 2 in the round of 32.Potgieter never trailed in his round of 16 match against Kyle DeBeer, but needed to go to the 19th hole to claim the victory. He then beat Laurenz Schiergen 2 & 1 in the quarterfinals. He was never down, and after the 11th hole was 5 up. In the semifinals, he beat Alex Maguire 3 & 1, again, he was never behind. In the finals, he faced Sam Bairstow, the highest-ranked player from Great Britain and Ireland, looking to become the first left-hander to win The Amateur in the modern era. Again Potgieter got off strongly, winning seven of the first 12 holes before shooting a bogey-free, four-under-par 66 to lead the morning session 7 up. In the afternoon round, Bairstow chipped away at the big lead and by the 14th hole, was just 2 down. But a double bogey at 15 derailed him, and the match ended on the 16th hole. Potgieter became only the third South African to win, joining Jovan Rebula, who won in 2018, and Bobby Cole, who won at Carnoustie in 1966. At age 17, Potgieter was the second-youngest winner of the Amateur, which began in 1885. Only Italy's Matteo Manassero was younger when he won at age 16 in 2009. Potgieter, who ranked 140th on the World Amateur Golf Ranking, earned a berth in the British Open at St. Andrews and a spot in the 2023 Masters and U.S. Open.
He missed the cut at the British Open, but his Amateur Championship victory opened doors, allowing Potgieter to play in some DP World Tour events. He was T-59th at the Investec South African Open, then missed the cut at the Alfred Dunhill Championship and AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open. In some amateur events in South Africa in 2023, he won the African Amateur Stroke Play Championship by a shot over Fabrizio De Abreu. His next start was the South African Stroke Play Championship, he was T-6th. He made it to match play in the South African Amateur Championship but lost in the first round to Christiaan Heyman 1 up. At the Junior Invitational at Sage Valley in South Carolina, he won by ten shots over Byungho Lee and Aaron Pounds. Just after that, Potgieter played in the Georgia Cup, which matches the U.S. and British Amateur champions, and Potgieter beat Sam Bennett 5 & 4.