Australian golf's new golden boy Elvis Smylie is making a good fist of contending on the European tour's celebrated $A9.2 million event at Sun City.
The 22-year-old Smylie landed a potentially career-changing two-year exemption on Europe's DP World tour thanks to his shock victory at the Australian PGA championship at Royal Queensland last month.
And taking advantage of that to play in the Nedbank Challenge in South Africa this week, the left-hander has made a promising start to lie just four shots off the lead at halfway in joint-12th place at the Gary Player Country Club.
In difficult windswept conditions, it could have been even better for Smylie if not for just two poor holes which he double-bogeyed in his second-round, level-par 72.
After birdieing the first two holes, Smylie found trouble at the par-four sixth when he found a greenside bunker then struggled with a chip shot to run up a six, a double-bogey he repeated at the 17th where he found the water.
But life is looking good for the young player who was ranked No.921 in the world at the end of 2023 and is now up to 229 after a spectacular run in which he's had top-10 finishes in six of his last seven tournaments, including wins in the Australian PGA and WA Opens.
Having expected to be playing mostly domestic events in 2025, the PGA win has opened up a new world for the son of former tennis pros Liz and Peter Smylie as he declared he would try to play as many events as he could on the European Tour until the end of the year, before heading for the lucrative Middle East swing.
Currently at the start of the 2025 'Race to Dubai' - the tour's order of merit - Smylie finds himself, crazily, leading the way, and a good finish in Sun City will keep him there.
But it's Frenchman Julien Guerrier who takes a one-shot lead into the weekend after a brilliant 68 in the strong winds, carding eight birdies and four bogeys to reach five under.
America's defending champion Max Homa led for much of the day before, like Smylie, has suffered two double-bogeys.
They came back-to-back on the 16th and 17th holes to ensure his two-shot advantage disappeared as Homa had to settle for a 75 which pushed him back to joint-fourth on three under.
He's a shot behind Frenchman Romain Langasque (70) and home favourite Ockie Strydom (73).
"It's a privilege to score under par in tough conditions like that," said Guerrier of his spectacular round. "I am very pleased.
"It was difficult to stay patient, you know you are going to make some mistakes, everybody does.
"This is difficult because you can hit some really good shots, like me on 17 but then you go into the water, just the wrong gust at the wrong moment, but that is part of this golf course."
