Warning for the ANWA 2026 field: the two most dominant forces in junior golf are teaming up to win the seventh edition of ANWA. It’s not Charlie Woods who is accompanying Asterisk Talley, the top-ranked female amateur in the world; it’s Miles Russell. He recently defended his title at the Junior Masters at the Sage Valley, where Woods Jr. finished last in the 36-player field.

The 54-hole event, 5 days before the Masters, will be held from April 1–4, 2026, at Champions Retreat and Augusta National. But it remains unclear whether Russell will stay on the bag all week, because many players switch to club caddies for the final round at Augusta National.

This will be the third time Talley tries to win this event. She finished 8th in her first try in 2024 and almost won the tournament last year before eventually finishing runner-up, one shot shy of Carla Bernat Escuder. In 2025, Talley had Robert Geisbert on her bag. He is a family friend and a former coworker of her father. By bringing in Russell, she is looking to win, and there’s a reason for it.

Though Russell caddying for anyone might seem unexpected, his partnership with Talley is a proven winning formula. The two paired together in mixed sessions for the 2025 U.S. Junior Ryder Cup team at Nassau Country Club in New York. They went undefeated with a 1-0-1 record, helping Team USA reclaim the cup 17.5 to 12.5.

And most recently, the two made history at Sage Valley in March 2026, becoming the first-ever male and female players to repeat as champions in the same year. Russell surged with a closing 67 to finish at -15, while Talley carded her own final-round 67 to win the girls’ division at -8. Talley explained the chemistry in simple words after Sage Valley.

“Miles and I are good friends, so I think it’s nice for us to win this tournament. I know it gives us both a lot of confidence, so we just had a great week this week, and I think we’re going to take that with us for the next couple of tournaments,” Talley said.

Russell added, “It’s pretty cool. Probably out of all the girls, I probably know her the most just from Junior Ryder Cup. It’s pretty cool to see her win it again and I’m just glad I didn’t mess that up.”

After the ANWA, Talley is set to sign with Stanford University this November, while Russell is verbally committed to Florida State University (FSU).

While Russell and Talley are making all the strides, Miles Russell’s competitor and now teammate is navigating a different kind of battle.

The different path of Charlie Woods

After finishing last season with his second AJGA title for the Benjamin School, Charlie Woods decided to commit to Florida State University in February 2026, a different path from his father’s Stanford legacy.

However, his first appearance since committing to FSU did not go as planned. At the 2026 Junior Invitational at Sage Valley, he struggled but showed great character by congratulating Miles Russell, who beat him by 41 shots.

Now, Charlie is taking some time off to reset. He was recently spotted at the SoFi Center in Florida, snatching a significant amount of attention in his new Florida State gear while cheering for his father’s TGL team, Jupiter Links GC, in the TGL S2 finale.