Another Georgia Tech golfer has claimed one of the world’s prestigious amateur tournaments. With a victory in the match-play final, Tech All-American Christo Lamprecht won the Amateur Championship on Saturday in Southport, England, besting a 288-player field that included many of the top amateurs in the world.
Lamprecht, who led the Yellow Jackets to a second-place finish at the NCAA Championships this past season, defeated Switzerland’s Ronan Kleu 3 and 2 in the 36-hole match-play final at Hillside Golf Club. It qualified him for the Open Championship in July and next year’s U.S. Open and also earned him an invitation to the Masters in April.
“It’s amazing,” he told media in Southport of the spot in the Open field. “It’s probably the biggest kind of milestone I’ve put myself up for this year before I turn pro, hopefully, is just to get myself in a major and get that experience. To get into three is pretty amazing, I’m not going to lie.”
Lamprecht follows former Jackets Andy Ogletree and Tyler Strafaci, who won the U.S. Amateur in 2019 and 2020, respectively. More historically, he joins two former Tech golfers from a different era – the great Bobby Jones and Charlie Yates – who won the British Amateur in 1930 and 1938, respectively. Jones’ triumph was part of his grand slam in which he won both the open and amateur championships in the U.S. and Great Britain all in the same year. For Lamprecht, who can bomb 320-yard drives off the tee, it is the peak accomplishment in a year in which a recommitment to consistent practice habits helped him finish with the seventh lowest scoring average in Division I this past season, according to Golfstat.
On Saturday, the South African Lamprecht was down two holes early in the 36-hole match but rallied to take a two-hole lead through 16 holes. In the second 18, Lamprecht extended his lead to as many as four holes before closing out the match at the 16th hole. Kleu, who recently completed his college career at Iowa, played his first three seasons at Columbus State.
Lamprecht became the third South African winner in the past six years. His parents were watching from home in South Africa.
“I know my mom is probably getting a panic attack for sure,” Lamprecht said. “Dad is probably crying for some reason. Yeah, I know they are ecstatic, and I can’t wait to call them.”
Lamprecht, the sixth-ranked amateur in the world before the tournament, barely made it out of the stroke-play portion of the event into match play. He finished in a tie for 62nd and had to play a preliminary match-play matchup just to get into the match-play field of 64.
“I’m kind of over the moon,” Lamprecht said. “I haven’t kind of won something big in a long time, and it’s one to win definitely for sure. I’m ecstatic. I cannot kind of comprehend my feelings right now. I’m just over the moon.”
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