Thomas Pieters

It was Thomas Pieters maiden victory at the D+D Real Czech Masters this weekend, when he secured a three shot victory over Pelle Edberg at the Albatross Golf Resort in Prague.

It was a comfortable victory in the end, despite a double bogey on the front nine, and Edberg never looked like catching him. He had a bizarre two penalty that he called on himself in his third round, when he played the wrong ball out of the rough. But he bounced right back and shot a 65, in a round which otherwise featured an eagle and 7 birdies. Blazing that shit up!

Victory at the Czech Masters has made Pieters the third, and youngest, Belgium to win on the European Tour. His rookie season in 2014 saw him loosing out to Miguel Angel Jimenez in a play off for the Open de España. He also came fourth in Abu Dhabi earlier this year, so he is clearly one to keep a close eye on.

Here’s a bit more background on this very exciting talent, who are sure we are going to be hearing a lot more about.

He had a celebrated amateur golf career in America, where he beat the likes of Jordan Spieth and former world amateur number one Patrick Canley to win the NCAA Division I Golf Championship in his second year at the University of Illinois.

He’s coached by Pete Cowen, who he first met at the Top Sport School Golf of the Golf Association Flanders, which he attended before heading off to the States. Pete also coaches Graham McDowell and Lee Westwood, so he’s in pretty good company. In 2013 he came through all three stages of the Qualifying School, and took the 20th card at the Final Stage.

As we reported earlier this week, the 23 year old absolutely smashes it off the tee, just like his fellow Belgium Nicholas Colsearts. He was averaging 320 years off the tee, which was over 6 yards further than the next longest hitter.

Despite his mammoth tee shots, he was also very accurate hitting 66.7% of fairways, making him the 24th most accurate driver last week. Pieters also dominated the putting stats, being number one and averaging just 26.7 putts per round, a full shot lower than anyone else in the field.  To put that into perspective, that’s longer than Bubba Watson and Dustin Johnson and less putts per round then Jordan Spieth has averaged this season.

He’s also got an nice website, where you learn that he has travelled 105,128 kilometers so far in 2015, which is 2.62 times around the world. We think the way he is going he will be doing a few more as well.

He’s on Twitter @thomas_pieters and has 3,352 followers and is following 328. We are not one of them yet. We’ll have to change that!

And here's his group family hug on winning. There's a golfer in there somewhere!