Staff WriterThe AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open didn’t so much begin as it happened to the field on Thursday, with La Réserve Golf Links turning into a wind tunnel with attitude and a rain machine that refused to take the afternoon off.
The leaderboard ended the day packed tighter than a pod of dolphins, because in weather like that, golf stops being a beauty contest and becomes a polite argument with the elements.
From dawn to dusk the wind leaned on every shot, the showers arrived in squalls, and the course kept asking the same question: how badly do you want par? South Africa’s Casey Jarvis and Scotland’s Scott Jamieson answered best, emerging from the mess with matching rounds of five-under-par 67 to share the clubhouse lead. Play couldn’t be completed as darkness shut the door, with the opening round set to restart on Friday morning.
Behind them, the chasing pack is one stroke back and already looks like it’s forming a queue at the lifeboat station. Among the six players in that group are 2017 AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open champion Dylan Frittelli, Herman Loubser—currently second on the Sunshine Tour Courier Guy Order of Merit—and Brandon Stone.
If you want a snapshot of the day’s difficulty, here it is: 155 players started, and only 33 finished under par. That’s not a leaderboard; that’s a triage list.
Even the two men sitting at the top weren’t immune to the course’s little bursts of cruelty. Both Jarvis and Jamieson signed for rounds that included double bogeys—proof that Thursday wasn’t about perfection, it was about recovery. A good bounce wasn’t guaranteed, a straight drive felt like a small miracle, and every crosswind carried the threat of turning a confident swing into a sheepish stroll.
South Africa’s Jayden Schaper, fresh off victory at last week’s Alfred Dunhill Championship, kept his momentum rolling with a three-under 69 as he hunts back-to-back wins. He also offered the most accurate weather report you’ll ever hear from a man holding a scorecard.
“It’s a tough course out there and we were out there for quite some time. I managed to stay calm and not focus too much on the wind around me. I did well to block it out. But it’s definitely a challenge out there. It’s very windy and the course is quite tight, and there are a lot of crosswinds.”
Frittelli, who knows a thing or two about winning this tournament, sounded like a man who’d been introduced to the modern version of La Réserve and decided it wasn’t interested in being anyone’s friend.
“The wind was howling and we had three rain squalls come through. I was really happy to be under par today. But I’m also starting to learn this course.”
That last line matters for what comes next at the Mauritius Open: this place doesn’t merely punish poor shots, it punishes poor decisions. You can be brave, but you’d better be clever. You can chase flags, but you’d better know where the miss lives. And if you’re learning the course in these conditions, you’re doing it at full volume.
There was also a note of satisfaction from Levy, who emerged from the opening day right in the mix after negotiating the same sideways rain and stubborn gusts that sent others tumbling up the board.
“It was tough and I played really well. There was wind and rain and it was really tricky. You have to keep the ball on the fairway because this is a very tricky golf course.”
No argument there. In calm weather, a golf course can flatter you. In wind and rain, it tells the truth. Thursday’s truth at La Réserve was simple: fairways are gold dust, crosswinds are thieves, and patience is a scoring club.
As the first round resumes on Friday morning, expect the leaderboard to keep bunching and unbunching like traffic in a storm. Jarvis and Jamieson have drawn first blood, but with proven winners like Frittelli lurking and Schaper swinging with confidence, the AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open is already shaping up as the kind of week where the toughest player—not the prettiest swing—ends up holding the trophy.
