Player Profile

“I love playing in South Africa and I’m really looking forward to ending an amazing year by making my debut at the Nedbank Golf Challenge in honour of Gary Player.”

Penge heads to Sun City as one of the most in-form golfers on the DP World Tour this season and perfectly positioned to make a spectacular debut in “Africa’s Major” amidst an equally spectacular rise in his career.

The Englishman was the only three-time winner on the DP World Tour this past season, having claimed his maiden DP World Tour victory in April’s Hainan Classic and then added the Danish Golf Championship and the Open de España in a six-month stretch that has transformed his career.

He ended the season in second place on the overall Race to Dubai Rankings and climbed inside the top 30 on the Official World Golf Ranking.

Of Italian descent, Penge’s first love was football and he showed incredible promise here, securing trials with both Reading Football Club and Southampton Football Club. But golf, which he started at the age of five, became his main focus in his late teens.

His 2025 performance comes on the back on a period of uncertainty when in 2021 he was sidelined for 15 months because of a knee injury caused by arthritis and which required surgery.

A few years later and Penge’s career has hit the kind of heights that saw him narrowly miss out on a place on the European team for the 2025 Ryder Cup, but also securing himself a PGA TOUR card for next season.

It’s apt that he returns to South African fairways this December where his incredible year began when he finished third in the Investec South African Open in March.

As one of the longest hitters in the game, Penge will relish the challenge of the Gary Player Country Club.