The second round of the Volvo China Open will leave three very young Asian players at the top of the leaderboard who are already cutting a path with a machete through the jungle of professional golf. They are Yanhan Zhou (-11), Bowen Chai (-11), both Chinese, and Kuangyu Chen (-9), who holds Australian nationality but is of direct Chinese descent and also lives in Shenzhen
– Chen is the oldest of the three, although he is only 23, and the last to turn professional, in June 2025, just after finishing his studies at the University of California, where he was part of the Golden Bears golf team (he won a collegiate tournament in 2024). Well, two weeks ago he won his first tournament as a professional on the China Tour, the China Sports-Lottery Chongqing Open, by one stroke over Yanhan Zhou, would you believe it, who finished in second place and of whom much has been written and said recently, as the prodigy of golf he has been (and is), with those eleven victories he already boasts in professional tournaments (all on the China Tour), when he had barely turned 18
-Last week, that is, one week after Chen’s winning debut, it was Chai’s turn, who at 20 also won for the first time as a professional and, likewise, on the China Tour (Lanting Shaoxing Open), which is becoming something of a nursery for world golf. Zhou was not in that tournament, by the way…
– Before this week Chen had barely played eleven official world-ranking events. As soon as he finished his university studies in the United States he tried his luck on PGA Tour Americas, where he played seven events and only made one cut… In fact, the Australian is making his debut this week on the DP World Tour
– Chai is much more experienced, that’s for sure… He has already played 23 official world-ranking events and is playing his third tournament on the European circuit (he played the Volvo China in 2025 and the Hainan Classic a month ago), with some appearances also in HotelPlanner Tour events held in China
– So watch out for those two this week, Chen and Chai, because they have just recently won and they clearly learn quickly, although normally the nerves would weigh more over the weekend
– Zhou, beside them, and despite being the youngest of this curious trio, already seems like a veteran, with almost fifty official world-ranking events under his belt (he has been playing them since before turning 15; in fact, he won one before turning 15). Zhou also comes off a third place at the Hainan Classic, a tournament also belonging to the Asian Swing of the European circuit, whose partial ranking awards three places for the PGA Championship. If he finishes up high this week he would leave himself good chances of grabbing one of those three places once the tournament in Turkey finishes next week, where he will also compete. It would be quite an achievement, because he was also unable to play in India due to a visa problem
