What's in the Bag - Richard Sterne

Royal Johannesburg & Kensington GC set the scene for yet another emphatic South African display as Richard Sterne romped clear at the Joburg Open, so we studied the

Genworth Financial Statistics

to see just how he did it.

No one could keep pace with Sterne, who fired rounds of 63-65-68-64 to post an emphatic total of 27 under par and win by seven from Charl Schwartzel, the last man to win so comfortably on South African soil when he triumphed by 12 strokes at the Alfred Dunhill Championship.

The key to Sterne’s dominance was clearly his accuracy into the greens, which saw him miss just seven greens all week to post a stunning 90.3 per cent and rank first in Greens in Regulation.

This is an improvement on his already-impressive 2013 numbers so far, where he ranks 16^thon Tour in GIR hitting 77.3 per cent, and even more so in comparison to his stats from last year, which saw him rank just 87^thhitting 69.4 per cent.

For a man hitting so many greens you might have expected Sterne’s putting numbers to be a little down on his opponents’, but quite to the contrary, as the now six-time European Tour winner posted an impressive 28.5 Putts per Round to rank 12^thfor the week, while his Putts per GIR was a staggering 1.649 to rank fourth.

This is a huge improvement on his numbers on the greens from last season where he ranked just 89^thin Putts per GIR with 1.787 and 71^stin Putts per Round with 29.7, so it is no wonder that Sterne was so dominant last week.

Aside from this prodigious accuracy into, and on, the putting surfaces, Sterne was also almost as impressive from the tee where he ranked 15^thfor the week in Driving Accuracy, while his skill from sand was top notch, not failing to get up and down in all four rounds.

Such dominant form cannot be expected throughout the rest of the season from a man who missed much of the 2010 and 11 seasons due to a severe back injury, but with Sterne clearly back to somewhere near his best, it would be no surprise if he were to add more titles to his resume in the months to come.

Here’s what was in his bag:

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