Karlsson ready for 'fresh' start in Austria

Anton Karlsson is hoping to draw on his RAM Cape Town Open victory in February as he tees it up at the Austrian Open as the European Challenge Tour season resumes this week.

Karlsson won his maiden Challenge Tour title in South Africa earlier this season, before golf on the European Tour and Challenge Tour was suspended on March 8 due to the global coronavirus pandemic.

Returning to action fresh, Karlsson is raring to go in the fourth event on the 2020 Road to Mallorca.

“It feels like a really long time ago,” said Karlsson. “It’ll be tough to try and bring something from there to here; it still feels good having that week under my belt, but it feels like the start of a new season.

“It’s almost like coming out for the first event of the year and like I’m looking back on a good finish to last season. But we’ll try and do something similar this week. I've played a lot of golf coming into this week, it has felt different to how you would approach a normal tournament. You need to find the momentum of tournament golf again.

“It’s a bit weird being back, but really fun. I’m trying to get used to things again, and also some new things that we have never experienced before – it should be a fun week.”

Like his fellow competitors and all personnel on site, Karlsson was subject to a pre-event coronavirus screening, conducted by healthcare specialists Cignpost as part of the European Tour’s comprehensive Health Strategy.

“I had to do a test in Sweden a few days ago in order to get into Austria – that was a little bit easier than this one,” said Karlsson. “It’s not the most pleasant feeling (doing the test), but it came back negative, which is important. Everyone is doing their tests, as they should, and everyone is healthy.”

In order to help mitigate risk, all players, caddies and on-site personnel will be tested, and participants will operate within national public health guidelines, including social distancing and following enhanced hygiene directives.