WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

JAMES

KINGSTON

The latest in our series of popular catch-ups with a household name on the Sunshine Tour from yesteryear​​​​​​​ 

BY MIKE GREEN​​​​​​​ 

He's almost a little bashful about it, and he's certainly talked about it often enough: James Kingston made a hole-in-one on the 15th at Houghton Golf Club in the 2002 Alfred Dunhill Championship that's often referred to as the luckiest hole-in-one.


'One of the shots that I'm famous for – I don't know whether that shouldn't be infamous for,' he laughs, 'was my hole-in-one off a tree in the Dunhill event at Houghton in 2002.


'It's a long time ago, you know, and I keep being reminded of it. I remember it was the Saturday, round three. I was in a good position, and when I got to 15, I was going to try and hit a 4-iron just right of the flag and let the wind move it in a little bit, right to left.


'As I hit it, the ball came out left and I was actually disgusted, so I started walking off the tee box. It was just a few seconds later, and I heard my caddie shout something. As I looked up, I was just in time to see my ball go in the hole, not having seen that it deflected off a tree. The ball was probably going to miss the green by 10 or 15 yards. It was a disaster shot, but it hit the tree, ricocheted right and went right in the middle of the hole.


'That's all it needed to do.'

The miraculous fluke won him an Audi TT sports car, which was worth R330 000 back then – nearly R1.1-million now.


But that's not the sort of car you'd associate James Kingston with: If we're going to go down that road, you're probably going to end up thinking in terms of something like a Toyota Fortuner – top of the range, sure, but the baseline characteristic has to be reliability.


He had six Sunshine Tour titles in the bag, from his first in 1995, before he broke through on the European Tour when he won the South African Airways SA Open Championship in 2007 at Pearl Valley.


A final round of 71 was enough to get him to four-under and beat England's Oliver Wilson by one shot. Kingston had been a member of the European Tour for almost 20 years, but this represented his first victory.


Darren Clarke, Kyron Sullivan, Garth Mulroy and Louis Oosthuizen all finished in a tie for third place on one-under. Greg Norman made a rare appearance and finished tied for seventh on level par.


Typically, having broken through at that level, he followed up with a second victory in the European Tour, in the Mercedes Benz Championship (originally the German Masters) in September 2009, beating Anders Hansen of Denmark. Ironically, Hansen went on to win the Sunshine Tour Order of Merit that year, with Kingston finishing 10th.


Now he plies his trade on the Legends Tour, where he is one of the dominant figures with four victories, 11 runner-up finishes, 11 third-place finishes and 34 other top-10s. He has won north of R33-million since he started on the circuit in 2016.

'There is a crop of new South African names emerging on the world stage. There are a lot of good players out here who will make a name for themselves over a number of years.'

While the money is clearly motivation enough, the truth is Kingston keeps going because competing is in his blood, and the tour gives him the opportunity to maintain deep and lasting friendships built by the game. He travels with Brazilian-born Adilson Da Silva on that tour, as well as with Keith Horne, and, when he's there, Doug McGuigan.


When he won the 2025 OLX Irish Legends, he credited a putting lesson with New Zealand's 2005 US Open champion Michael Campbell for helping him win. That kind of camaraderie is what gives him so much pleasure.


And he sees how the Sunshine Tour is creating opportunities for other players to get in on the kind of later-life career bloom he has experienced.


'The talent we have on the Sunshine Tour is unbelievable,' he said. 'It's because of a lot of people. They've given the guys an opportunity to play and a tour that's competitive with something to play for.


'There is the partnership with the DP World Tour, and, more recently, the HotelPlanner Tour, and, as I anticipated, there is a crop of new South African names emerging on the world stage. There are a lot of good players out here who will make a name for themselves over a number of years. If a guy plays well, the world opens up to him.'

Because of his experience on the Legends Tour, he became instrumental in getting the local seniors tour into a more stable place, and was part of the process in getting it rebranded as the Sunshine Legends Tour. The aim is to create a sustainable and thriving circuit for the country's senior professionals, including working closely with the Legends Tour in Europe on possible future tournament collaborations.


'I feel very proud, together with so many of my fellow professionals, to have contributed to the growth of South African golf through our careers,' Kingston said when it launched. 'I turned professional in 1989, which is a lifetime ago. I won my first tournament in Polokwane and my first-place cheque was R4 000. It was one of the greatest moments of my career to win the South African Open in 2007, against some of the best players in the world, and then to also win the South African Senior Open was just as special.


'The Sunshine Legends Tour will hopefully be a worthy platform to pay tribute to all of the wonderful careers that have helped to shape South African golf and allow our senior professionals to play more regularly and compete in proper tournaments,' he added.


One thing can be certain wherever Kingston goes: He will walk over to you and shake your hand with the firmest of grips, as he greets you and makes you feel you belong in that circle of friends he has made in golf – and the greeting will be completely unaffected and unconditional.

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