South African golfer Casandra Alexander has the ambition to be the best in the world in the coming years and given her form over the last few seasons, you would be foolish to rule it out.
Alexander, 25, won the 2025 Investec Order of Merit after sizzling on the home circuit, and also tied for seventh at the prestigious 2024 Women’s Open in the United Kingdom.
The improvement in her game since 2023 has been stark and there is no doubt she is on a rapid upward trajectory. Crucially, she has the ambition to not just settle for home success, but take her talent global.
“I’m not number one in the world now, but if I keep doing what I’m doing and working hard, it could potentially be a possibility in the future,” Alexander told FORBES AFRICA.
She started playing around the age of 10 when a family friend took her to a local golf club and the youngster was hooked.
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“I played a lot of sports growing up from about the age of eight and I loved all of them. Anything with a ball I was pretty interested in,” she says.
“Golf was just another sport at that stage, but it kind of stuck because I was pretty good at it from the start.
“When I got to high school, in my final years I only played hockey and golf. In the end I was better at hockey, so I decided to go to golf because I wanted to push myself and be better. I am a little bit stubborn like that.”
She turned professional in 2019 but her early career was stalled by the Covid-19 pandemic. But once up and running on the Ladies European Tour, she began to get rewarded.
Alexander likens life on the tour to gambling, where there is no guarantee you will come close to recouping the money you have to spend to play.
“You have to take risks in order to get what you want. And I did that,” she says. “When my caddie (Charles Moemedi) and I came to Europe, I said to him, ‘I have enough money to pay for four tournaments, and if we don’t make any money, you and I are both without a job’.
“And luckily, in those four weeks, we did extremely well. It was a big investment and a big risk on my end. People think getting your tour card is the tough part, but when you have the card, you also need the money to start.
“To play on the tour costs me R1.5-million ($82,000) a year, which means I need to make more than that just to break even. Never mind household running expenses and just living in general. That’s just the golf costs.
“So it’s risky. I say golf is like gambling. You can literally put all this money in and make zero. Or you can put all this money in and make a lot. And it is addictive, just like gambling is.”
Golf may be seen as a solo sport, but Alexander believes she would not be where she is today without the team behind her.
“I call Charles my second husband, we spend so much time together. He is family. He has carried for me from the start, all the way to Europe, to the Majors and the US Open.
“My mental coach is Mark Fairbank. We also work very closely together. He has worked with me since I went to Q School (qualifying school), and we’ve done great work. He’s probably one of the last guys I’d fire if I ever had to fire my team!
“My golf coach is Grant Veenstra, probably the best in the country, if not top 10 in the world. I’ve been working with him for the last two years. He’s a great guy and has changed my whole game around.
“Then obviously my biggest supporter is my husband (professional body builder Adrian Alexander). He doesn’t have a title, like a trainer or anything, but he’s probably the rock that keeps everything going.”
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