One half of Denmark’s identical twins grabs European Tour card

Three years ago German amateurs Jeremy and Yannik Paul made history by becoming the first twins to play on the European Tour – for five days it looked like we might go one better with Denmark’s Nicolai and Rasmus Hojgaard both threatening to seal their European Tour cards at Q School.

In the end Rasmus made it through after closing with successive 66s to tie for fifth while Nicolai slipped back with a 72.

Both 18-year-olds have featured on the Challenge Tour this season but Nicolai had a remarkable year after getting an invite and then finishing second at the KLM Open on the European Tour, an effort that pocketed him over €220,000.

The teenager, who turned pro earlier this year, shared the lead with Sergio Garcia with four holes to play and just missed an eagle putt at the last to force a play-off.

How interesting is this?!!

Denmark's identical twins – 18-years-old Nicolai and Rasmus Højgaard – both shot 68s in the fourth round to be tied for 42nd place after the 4th round of @ETQSchool!!

Incredible things happen in sport. pic.twitter.com/NhPWuq0kw4

— Joy Chakravarty (@TheJoyofGolf) November 19, 2019

Nicolai told NCG that the first score he looks at is what the score is for the person in the all-important 25th spot and then his brother.

“That’s the big one, the 25th spot, then I will look for Rasmus’ score and then the other Danes. Our careers have followed a similar path, Rasmus had a very good 2017, I had a good 2018 but we’ve never been far apart.”

So who’s the longest?

“I would say me, just,” he replied, laughing. “But maybe he’s a bit straighter. We played the first two rounds on the Challenge Tour in Denmark in 2017 and it was weird, it didn’t really feel like a proper tournament.”

The pair arrived via different routes, Rasmus from the Challenge Tour Grand Final in Mallorca, where he finished the season in 21st place, while Nicolai travelled up from Alicante.

Otherwise Nicolai has the edge in world rankings, 393 to 400, and reached World No. 5 on the amateur rankings, to Rasmus’ 22nd, but together they were part of Denmark’s first World Amateur Team Championship title.

Thomas Bjorn has singled, or doubled, them out as ones to watch and we might very soon get to see them Nicolai joining Erasmus soon on the big stage in the near future.

Mark will be at Lumine for the remainder of Q School. Keep up to speed with all the action on Twitter.