Peter Karmis is South Africa’s ‘Mr 59’. He speaks in staccato phrases. And he thinks in between them. And he punctuates them with interesting insights – insights into himself and the game. He won the 2009 Lombard Insurance Classic with a closing 13-under-par 59 at Royal Swazi Spa. So those insights are worth a little attention.

After that victory, he had to wait until October 2016 for his next title, his third of five on the Sunshine Tour. He’s also won on the Asian Tour, in Singapore.

And he went on to become one of just two multiple winners (after Oliver Bekker) on the Sunshine Tour in 2017 when he won the Investec Royal Swazi Open in May and the Sun City Challenge in August. That also gets some attention.

Let’s get one of the things to which we should listen out of the way: “I think South African golfers are soft,” says Karmis. “We think that practice is the way to get the ball in the hole, but we need something more than that. Jack Nicklaus lived in Ohio, where there are five months of snow every year. There’s no practicing in those conditions. We get a few drops of rain and we moan.

“We can drink the water wherever we go in South Africa, but we have a moan when we have to travel. When I travelled in India, there were some pretty dodgy places to stay, even though I was lucky with where I stayed.

“We really need to learn to produce the goods when things are going against us.”

That’s exactly what Karmis has managed to do after he looked for a way out of the title drought that lasted over six years – learned to produce the goods.

“I’m thrilled with the way things are going at the moment. It’s nice to be improving,” he says. “I’ve been seeing Quintin van der Berg in Cape Town. He’s helped me a lot with my swing, some of my mechanics. He’s got quite a bit of tech there as well – Flightscope and a thing called Boditrak, and even a thing on putting. He knows what he’s talking about.”

Given his appearance, you could be forgiven for thinking Karmis and tech are a match made in heaven. It’s not true. “I’ve never really used the tech,” he says. “I don’t know much about all the tech and how to use it. You have to know what you’re doing, but in this day and age, you can’t avoid the tech. To be honest, I don’t really care what it looks like. I just want to know if that’s the right data.”

And given his natural scepticism, you’d also think Karmis is pretty much the ideal candidate to throw the baby of teaching methods out with the self-taught bathwater. But no. “What I’ve enjoyed about seeing Quintin – and this is not necessarily unique – is that he’s given me one thing at a time to do,” he says. “Most teachers teach by doing five things at a time. Initially – and I didn’t know this at the time – he made a plan for two years. That’s his philosophy. If you stop seeing him, that’s fine, but that’s the procedure he follows. Maybe other guys are trying to band-aid something, or give you everything you need to work on.

“I actually don’t like to know too much. That’s why I have enjoyed getting just the one thing at a time, because I don’t have to tie myself up into knots.

“The one thing becomes ingrained quite quickly. And as I have gone along with him over the last 12 months, I’ve started trusting him more. Now, I implicitly trust him. He doesn’t even have to show me why – I just do it.”

That trust was earned in a pretty emphatic way. “I saw him last year a month before I won the Mount Edgecombe tournament in October,” he says. “So, I had one lesson, and four weeks later I won. That lesson was on the Boditrak device. It measures the pressure you apply during your swing. I was just trying it out, but he gave me quite an important lesson. There’s data available on what a swing should look like. I started driving it better overnight.

“I look back over a year now, and my swing has transformed and I’m very pleased about where it is and what it looks like. But I don’t care what it looks like. I just need to get the job done. My data has improved and all that kind of stuff.”

The man who was something of a maverick is now a different beast in competitive situations. “I find I go into tournaments trusting the things I’m doing,” he says. “And if I’m having a hard time, I have some skills now that I can use to iron out what need to be done. If I’m hitting it left, or right, or whatever, I have a few options that I can tackle. If you’re not seeing someone, you have to wing it. A lot of guys who are feel players can figure it out. With the data, you can figure out what your parameters are and apply the right tactic to deal with a certain issue. If I have a bad round, or hit a couple of bad shots, I’m optimistic that I can sort it out.”

That can-do approach means he is looking further afield than the Sunshine Tour now. “My goals are the same, but now I feel like I can achieve them,” he says. “They include getting on to the European Tour. My goals are always super-lofty.”

He has the tools to achieve those super-lofty goals. “I do have this ability to shoot some good numbers,” Mr 59 says without a trace of irony. “So if I’m playing well, I can go low, which is a great asset, but consistency is the key.”

That, and knowing yourself well enough to find the right kind of help.