The Global Series and the partner tours are different promises — here is what each one asks of a junior golfer this season.
Somewhere around the second or third season, most junior golf families arrive at the same question: what comes after the UAE? It is usually asked in the car park after a decent round, and usually gets a vague answer. The Infinity Junior Golf Tour gives a more precise one, because there are exactly two ways out of the country with the tour behind you, and they work quite differently. With the 2026/27 season starting on 26 September, this is the week to work out which one your golfer is aiming at.
The pathway has four steps, not one
The tour sets out the route in four stages: enter, compete, rank, travel. Entering means a first tournament at an age-appropriate yardage over nine holes. Competing means playing for Order of Merit points across the season. Ranking means a WAGR-recognised championship and a world amateur ranking earned without leaving the Emirates. Travelling comes last, and it comes from the three steps before it.
The order matters. Families sometimes want to skip to step four, because the destinations sound more exciting than another Saturday in Ras Al Khaimah. But every route abroad is fed by the domestic calendar: seventeen fixtures at six clubs across Dubai, Ras Al Khaimah, Sharjah and Al Ain.
Route one: the IJGT Global Series
The Global Series is the tour's own passport: events the IJGT runs itself across thirteen destinations spanning Asia, Africa and Europe — Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Qatar, Singapore, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Istanbul and the United Kingdom, alongside the UAE itself. Two are named so far: The Indian Swing at Zion Hills in Bangalore, and the Global Series event in Istanbul, whose host club has not yet been announced.
Because the tour runs them, they carry the format and the standards your golfer already knows. For a family taking a first trip abroad with a golf bag, that familiarity is worth a great deal.
Route two: partner tours and world championships
The second route is not the tour's to give — and the distinction is deliberate. Six organisations abroad recognise an IJGT season: The Junior Tour Powered by Under Armour and the FCG World Junior Golf Championship in the United States, the Asian Junior Masters and The Junior Golf Series in Thailand, the British Junior Golf Tour, and the Champion of Champions World Championship at Lough Erne in Northern Ireland. A strong year on the IJGT opens their doors. It does not buy a tee time.
That is why the Order of Merit is more than a leaderboard. Points follow finishing position across the season, boys and girls ranked separately in each of five age groups — ten divisions in all — with champions crowned at the Fairway Ventures Cup at Arabian Ranches on 5 and 6 April.
Where the world ranking is earned
Six or more fixtures this season carry World Amateur Golf Ranking recognition. Four of them are in the UAE, each played over three rounds: the Infinity Junior International Championship at Tower Links, 30 October to 1 November; the Infinity Junior Nations Cup at Al Hamra, 4 to 6 December; the Infinity Masters at Sharjah Golf and Shooting Club, 26 to 28 March; and the Infinity Junior WAGR at Al Hamra, 23 to 25 April. The first two are supported by the Emirates Golf Federation and carry triple recognition — EGF Order of Merit, WAGR and IJGT standings. The others are played abroad. Results across the tour are reported to Junior Golf Scoreboard.
One technical point is worth diarising now. At WAGR events, a golfer's division is set by their age on the date of that event's first round — not by the 1 October cut-off that governs every other fixture. A golfer with a winter birthday can therefore sit in one division in October and the next one up by March.
Planning the year backwards
If the target is a partner tour, work backwards from April rather than forwards from September. Decide early which ranking championships your golfer will play, remember that three rounds ask far more of a young player than a single Saturday, and treat the autumn fixtures as preparation rather than as the season itself.
Entries and full fixture details for the season are on the season calendar.
