As the Sunshine Tour tees off 2025 with its first tournament of the year this week in the Mediclinic Invitational, Jovan Rebula is equally excited to take on a new year with a strong sense of what’s possible in his own career.
Rebula heads into Thursday’s first round at the Heron Banks Golf and River Estate confident that he’s “unlocked” a new approach to his game. And he’s keen to keep testing it at the highest level during a run of tournaments – including European Challenge Tour and DP World Tour co-sanctioned events – still to come over the next few weeks.
“I feel like I’ve unlocked a different way of thinking around the golf course and around tournaments, so I’m eager to get going and see how well I can do,” says Rebula.
The source of Rebula’s confidence is his impressive finish to 2024, which included fourth place in the DP World Tour co-sanctioned AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open in December.
“That was an unbelievable event for me. It helped me a lot mentally just to know that I can do it and the game is there. I just need to trust myself more. I took a local caddie that week who could hardly speak English, so there was a satisfaction of knowing I had done everything myself. It was a big confidence boost. It gives me a different perspective moving into the year. It all comes down to you trusting yourself and playing your own game. That’s the goal I’ve been trying to get to, but I couldn’t necessarily feel it until Mauritius. Then I could actually experience playing my own game and not having any distractions. It sounds like a cliché, and everybody has been telling me to play my own game, but you can’t fully grasp it until you actually experience it. That was the big takeaway I got from that week.”
BIGGEST GOAL OF HIS CAREER
Rebula is now just outside the top 10 on the Sunshine Tour Order of Merit delivered by The Courier Guy, in 11th place, as he chases the biggest goal of his career this year.
“My main goal is to try and get back to playing golf in America again, if that’s the Korn Ferry Tour or PGA Tour. That’s ultimately where I want to play. I had an unbelievable finish in Mauritius, so it gives me confidence going into the rest of our season now, especially for the DP World Tour co-sanctioned events. We treat those like our Majors. You kind of start seeing yourself in places where you know you can be, which gives you the confidence to know you can perform in bigger events. I’m excited to build on that.”
Rebula also has the confidence of having finished tied third in last year’s Mediclinic Invitational, albeit on a different golf course.
“It’s a different golf course to Maccauvlei last year, and I haven’t played competitive golf on this course before. But the prep has gone well. I had a good holiday, and I’m excited to play.”