Karaoke, wine, food, happy hours, yoga, laughing? Beth Allen’s list of interests on her player biography sounds rather like the effervescent shenanigans and capers involved in The Herald sports desk’s Christmas night out. Following one or two robust libations, it’s easy to end up slumped in the Lotus position while clutching a microphone and croaking out a tearful rendition of ‘For the Good Times’ by Perry Como, after all.
There have been plenty of good times for Allen in 2016. Two wins on the Ladies European Tour, an order of merit title on the cards and a wedding to Coatbridge’s former British women’s amateur champion, Clare Queen. Life is pretty rosy for the cheery, Edinburgh-based Californian who is something of a ray of smiling sunshine on Leith. “Happiness is under-rated,” she said with a satisfied chortle.
Given the riches that are on offer over the Atlantic on the LPGA Tour, the best of the bunch on the European scene tend to embark on the kind of mass migration you get with flocks of barnacle geese. Allen is bucking the trend, though.
“I would be the first American to win the European order of merit and that would make me very proud as not many players from the US have committed to the tour,” she said. Having juggled competition on both sides of the pond, Allen maintains that fate played a hand in her full-time switch to Europe. America’s loss has been the European Tour’s gain. “I lost my card on the LPGA Tour in 2008, went back to qualifying school but didn’t get anything,” reflected the 34-year-old. “I thought ‘maybe this is a sign that I should go to Europe full time?’ I was 23 when I went onto the LPGA circuit for the first time. I had everything going for me but I didn’t perform. It was all new and you are trying to figure things out. It can be a lonely place. I was playing poorly and it all built up. You doubt yourself. For young people who haven’t found themselves and are growing it can be hard. Just because you had a bad day on a golf course it doesn’t make you a bad person. You shouldn’t punish yourself but it took me a while to figure that out. The LPGA Tour just wasn’t for me at the time and I still don’t think it is. Europe is the perfect place for me. The tour here has given me a lot.”
Allen has given a lot too. The donation of one of her kidneys to her brother, Dan, back in 2011 provided her with a renewed sense of perspective at a time when golf was becoming an all-consuming occupation. Professional golf can be a selfish old business but this was an act of complete selflessness.
“That period brought a complete change of mentality,” she said. “It was the first time I had a real break from golf. As soon as I knew my kidney was a match I had no hesitation in going for the operation. You don’t have second thoughts in those situations. I had five weeks off and it was a great time for the family as a whole as everything had gone well. I went back to play in Turkey with very limited expectations and made the cut and had a reasonable finish. I thought then, ‘why am I putting so much pressure on myself?’ I can do this’. All this pressure seemed to be lifted.”
Allen is currently in Florida competing in this week’s LPGA Tour qualifying school. If she succeeds there, she has vowed to stay loyal to Europe, preferring instead to use any category she gets in the US to fill in the gaps on her schedule. One place where loyalty will go out of the window, of course, is in the Solheim Cup and Allen knows an LPGA card plays a big part in those ambitions.
“I love Scotland and Europe but I’m very much an American,” she said. “That will never change. If you’d asked me five years ago about the Solheim Cup I’d have said ‘I don’t think that’s ever going to happen’. The fact I believe it can happen now is telling.”
Having racked up winnings of over £265,000 this season, Allen is paying her way. Which is a good job because sponsorship is not easy to find, especially in the women’s game. “It’s easy to get frustrated and have bad thoughts about that and I used to get really hung up about it,” she said. “I have a hat deal and a lovely group of ladies provide me with clothes. But there is no financial aid. I’m making money now, though. It’s upwards of £50,000 to play on the tour but I’m paying my way. And in golf you have to spend it to make it.”
For happy-go-lucky Allen, it continues to be money well spent.
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