Beth Coulter had been intending to go back to the United States and play in the Pre-Qualifying Stage of the LPGA Tour’s Qualifying Series, primarily as an experience-building exercise before going to the LET’s Lalla Aicha Q-School in December, but instead, she’s preparing to play in LET Access Series events in France and Switzerland over the next fortnight.
That’s because, due to her professional debut victory at the Women’s Irish Challenge at Malahide, followed up with a runner-up finish in the CSK Steel Women’s Open in Denmark a week later, the Kirkistown Castle woman has catapulted up the LET Access Series Order of Merit and, at ninth, is in with an excellent chance of pushing her way into the top seven at season’s end and earning an LET card without the need to go to Q-School at all.
“Yeah, originally that was the plan, you know, to get a bit of experience before LET Q-School,” she said from Saint-Omer where she’ll contest the Hauts de France Pas de Calais Golf Open. “A lot of the girls said that they found it really useful to go out and do it, to get the experience before Q-School, but then, obviously, after those first two weeks, the goal is to get an LET card so that’s what I’m going to try and focus on.
“I think if I tried to do France, then Switzerland and then go straight to LPGA Q-Series, I feel like I’d kind of be half-assing both, and I want to give it a good run so I’m fully focused on the LET Access and not going the LPGA route.”
The early months of a professional career are as much about learning the ropes as anything else, and she almost learned a lesson the hard way on her way to compete in France.
“I was trying to get from Madrid to Lille via Dublin, and I didn’t know that Ryanair don’t do transfers, so that was a bit of a screw up,” she laughed. “I literally got there like five minutes before the gate closed, and I was like, ‘Oh my God, I made it’. And my golf clubs made it too, thank God.”
After a stellar amateur career that included four years as an Arizona State Sun Devil, two Augusta National Women’s Amateur Appearances, three Irish Girls Close Championship wins and another in the Women’s Irish Close in 2022, and being part of the 2024 GB&I Curtis Cup-winning side, Coulter was always primed to turn professional once she completed her studies.
But seeing the success of her fellow Irish amateurs in their early years on the LET has only heightened her resolve to join them as quickly as possible.
“They are some of my best friends, not just in golf, but in life,” he explained. “Aíne, Anna, Sara and Lauren, and myself – we grew up together and now they’re like the guinea pigs and I’m asking them all the questions and it’s really cool to have their help and support.
“Canice [Screene] and I are the only Irish girls really playing on the LET Access now – Olivia [Mehaffey] has played a few – so that’s been a big adjustment in the few events I’ve played because I’m a real people person. I love being around my friends, and I had that all the way through college and in amateur golf in Ireland.
“That’s made me even more determined to join those girls on the LET as fast as I can.”
The Hauts de France Pas de Calais Golf Open runs from Thursday to Saturday and is a joint-forces event from the LET Access Series and the Alps Tour, and Coulter will play in the afternoon wave in round one.
You can follow her progress here.
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