Craig Howie set to focus on Challenge Tour in bid to win back DP World Tour card

Craig Howie looks set to focus mainly on the Challenge Tour this year in a bid to regain his DP World Tour status after not even coming close to securing a start on the main circuit so far in 2023.

Craig Howie has made a promising start to the new Challenge Tour season in South Africa. Picture: Angel Martinez/Getty Images.

The Peebles man finished 135th in last year’s Race to Dubai Rankings, having played in 26 events in his rookie campaign after graduating from the Challenge Tour at the same time as Ewen Ferguson.

He gave a good account of himself in both the Joburg Open and Mauritius Open as the new DP World Tour campaign got underway before Christmas, but that’s been it so far as opportunities are concerned.

Based on his Category 19 status, Howie was never in with a realistic chance of getting into either the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship or Hero Dubai Desert Classic, last month’s Rolex Series double-header in the Middle East.

But the 28-year-old was a bit shocked that he then found himself 17 spots below the cut-off line for the Ras Al Khaimah Championship before not getting a sniff for either the Singapore Classic or Thailand Classic.

“I’d been hoping to have had at least one opportunity already on the DP World Tour schedule this year,” admitted Howie, “but, when the cut-off came for Dubai, Ras Al Khaimah and Singapore, I had to shift my focus quite quickly.”

That has meant a return to the Challenge Tour, where he has already teed up in the opening two events of the season in South Africa over the past fortnight and has two more to come, starting with this week’s SDC Open in Limpopo.

“I’ve taken a lot of confidence from these two performances,” said Howie of tying for 23rd in the Bain’s Whisky Cape Town Open before carding four sub-par scores to secure a top-15 finish in the Dimension Data Pro-Am.

“Even though I played quite nicely over the weekend in Cape Town (where he shot a 64 in the third round), I felt like I wasn’t swinging it the best, so I did a lot of work on the range and my iron play was a lot better at Fancourt.

“It’s been solid so far without lighting anything on fire. Yeah, just chip away. I’m doing good stuff and I’ve just got to keep being solid and consistent and eventually one week I’l hopefully play well enough to contend.

“It looks like it will probably be a full Challenge Tour schedule, so it’s just a case of getting my head down and getting that DP World Tour card back.”

Howie is being joined at Zebula Golf Estate, where the event gets underway on Thursday, by Liam Johnston, David Drysdale, Doug McGuigan and Michael Stewart, who is making his first start on the circuit since securing a card through the PGA EuroPro Tour in its final season.

On the amateur front, Scottish duo Gregor Graham (Blairgowrie) and Matthew Wilson (Forres) are tied for seventh spot at the halfway stage in the South African Stroke-Play Championship at Mount Edgecombe.

Overnight leader Wilson had moved to seven-under after going out in two-under before coming home in five-over as he signed for a second-round 75, six more than Graham’s splendid effort earlier in the day.

On seven-under, Joshua Hill leads by a shot from Matthew McClean in an Irish 1-2 at the top of the leaderboard, while Gregor Tait and Jamie Mann, who sit on one-over and two-over respectively, joined Graham and Wilson in progressing to the final two rounds.