Magnificent Mistry lifts Liberty GNGU Junior title

TSHWANE, 10 February 2017 – Randpark golfer Kajal Mistry rounded off a sensational season last year with victory in the KwaZulu-Natal Junior Championships and befitting the country’s top ranked player, she began 2017 in fitting fashion with a magnificent performance in the Liberty GNGU Junior Girls Open earlier this month.

Mistry put on one of the classiest performances of the season with sublime eight-under-par 64 in the final round at Wingate Park Country Club to secure a one stroke victory on 142 over fellow Gauteng golfer Woo Ju Son.

The 16-year-old Bryanston resident carded a less than impressive 77 to lag eight shots behind Casandra Hall from Ekurhuleni, but four successive birdies to start the final round signalled her intentions to the field.

The country’s top ranked junior gained further ground with gains at the eighth and 10th, and cancelled a lone bogey at 11 with her seventh birdie at the par four 12th.

She drew level with Son with a birdie at 14 and she sealed her first trophy finish for the season with a superb three at the par four 17th.

The victory pushed the GolfRSA Elite Squad player back into the number one spot on the GolfRSA Womens Golf South Africa Junior Rankings, while she also tops the Senior rankings following her triumph in the Mpumalanga Championship last November.

RESULTS (top 20)
142 Kajal Mistry 77 65
143 Woo-Ju Son 70 73
144 Kiera Floyd 74 70
145 Casandra Hall 69 76
146 Symone Henriques 75 71; Chante Van Zyl 70 76
147 Danielle du Toit 74 73
148 Catherine Lau 74 74
151 Kaiyuree Moodley 78 73
155 Zane Naude 77 78
159 Kaylah Williams (AMA) 76 83
160 Kera Healey 84 76; Samantha Whateley 75 85
161 Jenefer Haw 77 84
162 Lindi Coetzee 80 82
164 Shanice De Gee 81 83; Gabrelle Venter 79 85
165 Nadia Van der Westhuizen 82 83
166 Megan Kraft 87 79
169 Noluthando Mdanda 87 82; Cleo Jordaan 79 90

PHOTO – Kajal Mistry with Emile Roux from Northerns Nomads; credit GNGU.