Unfortunately many of the world’s leading players such as Jason Day, Rory McIlroy and Jordan Spieth will not be competing due to concerns over the Zika virus.

South Africa’s three top-ranked golfers, Branden Grace, Louis Oosthuizen and Charl Schwartzel will not be competing either.

The two Americans, Rickie Fowler and Bubba Watson, is the two top-ranked players at the tournament.

Jaco van Zyl and Brandon Stone will be representing South Africa and the 23-year-old Rustenburg-born Stone says the purpose-built course in Rio will test the players.

“It’s an incredible course, it’s really something special,” said Stone.

“It doesn’t play like a new golf course as you’d expect because they purposely built it for this week.

“At the same time it’s really, really tough. It’s a true test of golf. It’s a true design. It’s really tricky and there are a lot of slopes in and around the greens.

“A big breeze has been blowing the last few days and is forecast to blow the rest of the week. So it will be a true test of golf like a major would be.

“The guy who gets a gold medal on Sunday is going to have earned that.”

Stone will be teeing it up at 13:52 on Thursday afternoon against Mexico’s Rodolfo Cazaubon and Austria’s Bernd Wiesberger.

Van Zyl will take to the tee at 14:25 the afternoon against Finland’s Mikko Ilonen and Canada’s David Hearn.

Morgan Piek/OFM News