HotelPlanner Tour rookie Charlie Forster finds himself entering this week’s Hangzhou Open, the final regulation event of the year, with new goals to achieve, having already accomplished what he set out to at the start of the year.
The Englishman started his debut season in the hope of keeping his card on the Road to Mallorca for 2027 but now finds himself ranked 25th and looking to keep rising.
Forster said he was pleased to have fulfilled his original aims, and excited about what the next two weeks hold.
“It’s always great when you achieve your goals and now I have some new goals to try and achieve,” he said.
“I just aimed to keep my card for this year, that was sort of the main target, and then whatever else came was a bonus. I’m happy I achieved that and we’ll see what’s still to come.
“I feel like I’ve had a lot of good weeks but I’ve been realising how important one or two shots are in the tournament. I’ve had a couple finishes where if I was one or two shots better it would have been a really good week, so I’m just sort of appreciating that.”
Forster started his season in South Africa having graduated from Long Beach State University in 2025 but made the step up to the HotelPlanner Tour with ease.
Although missing the cut in his first event at the Jonsson Workwear Durban Open, he finished in a share of 12th at the DP World PGTI Open in his second start to hit the ground running.
Since then he has had four top ten finishes to power up the Rankings and secure his spot in the Grand Final at the end of October with time to spare.
The 23-year-old says getting used to the professional world of golf has been a learning curve after the different style of American college golf, but one that he is taking in his stride.
“It’s been great just learning everything about professional golf,” he said. “Travelling to different countries each week has been fun, I’ve really enjoyed it. There’s been some up’s and down’s but I’m just happy to be out here.
“Having multiple events in a row has probably been the most different,” he added. “In amateur golf you might have one or two back-to-back and then you have a couple of weeks off but out here it’s four, five, six weeks in a row.
“The tournaments are different as well because in college you’re playing for an individual prize and a team prize, which is something I really miss from team golf.”
Forster enters this week’s Hangzhou Open off the back of his best finish of the season at last week’s Hainan Open, where he reached 20 under par to finish in a share of third, rising to 25th in the Road to Mallorca Rankings.
The Englishman has enjoyed his first visit to China and will be hoping his good form translates on to Hangzhou West Lake Golf Club this week.
“I think we faced all the elements last week from the humidity and the severe heat to the rain that we had on Friday, but I think I play some of my best golf in the rain.
“It was good fun; the scenery was great as well so if things weren’t going your way you just had to look around and appreciate where you were.
“This course is a bit more demanding off the tee so looking forward to that, it’s probably one of my strengths. Ball striking is a premium round here so I’m just trying to get comfortable really that’s the main thing.”
Forster joins a strong field at the Hangzhou Open that includes Road to Mallorca number one and two Christopher Blomstrand and Pablo Ereno, as well as 48 players from the China Tour.
Round one of the Hangzhou Open begins on Thursday at 6:30am local time, with Forster teeing off alongside Japan’s Kakeru Ozeki and England’s Chris Wood at 6:50am.
