Born in 1981, Richard Sterne is one of South Africa’s top golfers and has been playing professional golf since 2001, although up until a few years ago was a lesser known player.
Hailing from Pretoria, Richard Sterne played on the European Challenge Tour in 2002 and graduated to membership of the main European Tour in 2003. He won his first European Tour title at the 2004 Open de Madrid.
Richard Sterne Rankings
Sterne is currently ranked as world number 155 and after winning the Open de Madrid, his 5 top performances have been at The Celtic Manor Wales Open in 2007 (1st), The Alfred Dunhill Championship in 2008 (1st), The South African Open Championship in 2008 (1st) and the Alstom Open de France in 2013 (2nd).
However after 2013 Sterne’s career came to a halt when he had to undergo a hip operation in 2014. His swing suffered the effects of trying to play with the pain for six months and led him to putting in a huge amount of effort these last 2 years in order to come right.
But persistence pays off and Sterne played in The Open 2016 at Royal Troon (for which he qualified at the Open de France with a closing bogey) and finished T46, his best ever Open finish.
Most recently however Sterne has climbed the ranks and had his best ever Alfred Dunhill Links Championship performance where he shared second place at St Andrews on the 9th October this year. The lad from Pretoria, chipped in for birdie on the infamous Road Hole 17th on his way to a 66 and a total of 19 under par. England’s Ross Fisher birdied the last to join him there. They both finished four strokes behind the winner, Tyrell Hatton of England.
Sterne played the Nedbank Golf Challenge in November 2016 and although not his best performance, finishing T20 with one over par, the South African player is definitely going from strength to strength.
Richard Sterne Statistics
| Category | 2009 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 |
| Stroke Average | 71 | 70.75 | 71.09 | 70.04 | 71.87 | 70.72 | 70.89 |
| Driving Accuracy (%) | 69.32 | 61.61 | 60 | 64.99 | 59.84 | 60.24 | 58.41 |
| Driving Distance (Yards) | 287.17 | 281.53 | 297.71 | 293.36 | 288.11 | 292.47 | 295.32 |
| Greens In Regulation (%) | 69.82 | 69.44 | 69.44 | 71.83 | 65.93 | 71.6 | 69.67 |
| Average Putts Per Round | 29.41 | 29.56 | 29.68 | 29.6 | 30.19 | 29.89 | 29.85 |
| Putts Per Gir | 1.76 | 1.8 | 1.79 | 1.77 | 1.82 | 1.76 | 1.8 |
| Sand Saves (% / Total save attempts) | 56.52 / 46 | 53.85 / 13 | 46.23 / 106 | 45.45 / 121 | 48.96 / 96 | 59.09 / 22 | 51.65 / 91 |
He will be playing at Leopard Creek together with Charl Schwartzel (this year’s favourite to win), Branden Grace (also a former winner,) Kristoffer Broberg and Pablo Larrazabal at the Alfred Dunhill Championship, the first championship of the 2017 Euro Tour.
Current Golf Betting odds on the Alfred Dunhill Championship are:
| Charl Schwartzel | 33/10 |
| Branden Grace | 6/1 |
| Richard Sterne | 22/1 |
| Gregory Bourdy | 22/1 |
| George Coetzee | 22/1 |
| Brandon Stone | 25/1 |
| Thomas Aiken | 33/1 |
| Dean Burmester | 45/1 |
| Dylan Fritteli | 45/1 |
| Pablo Larrazabal 50/1 | 50/1 |
Read more about players to bet on at the Alfred Dunhill Championship.
Place your golf bets on the Alfred Dunhill Championship today.
We will keep watching Richard Sterne as he rises to golfing greatness.
