28-year-old PGA Advanced Professional, Alice Davis, has always had a drive to succeed. A Dorset country coach and founder of Parkstone Golf Club’s popular Pink Ladies Academy, Davis is ambitious to continue to develop as a professional and since her earliest days as a PGA Member has set out to make an impact.
Davis shares insights into her passion for the game, her dedication to helping others get into golf and why continuous professional develop is so crucial for her.
What do you enjoy most about working in golf?
I love the game of golf. I love that it is a game that can never be totally mastered. There are so many technical aspects to the swing and the on-course decision making, and from that perspective, every player is still learning. I love playing it and I love watching other people play.
I am a people person. I enjoy spending time with others and making new friendships. I also enjoy working with them to figure out the best way I can share my knowledge to help them improve.
Most of all, I love the whole golf environment. I am lucky to work in a beautiful setting at Parkstone Golf Club that I can enjoy every day. It’s a progressive members club and both watching and influencing how it can evolve in the years to come is a joy. I am also involved in the Dorset County Golf Union and helping with the progression of young aspiring players, which is very rewarding.
Was it always your ambition to become a golf coach?
I fell in love with golf when I was seven years old. I played to a decent standard through my teens, but I always had a strong passion for teaching. I was lucky to be taught by a range of great PGA Professionals, so I saw the impact they could have on players, and the smiles they could put on people’s faces. I knew that making it as a tour player was going to be very hard and take over my life. I was surrounded by female players who were better than me, so the odds were against me, so I plotted my path to become a teaching professional. It’s the most rewarding decision I have ever made.
What do you find most challenging about coaching?
The game of golf is constantly changing and so are the public and members clubs that provide the facilities. As a PGA Professional, I have to keep current with the latest best practices and innovations in the game to make sure that I am offering the best experience to my pupils. Being a PGA Professional is a business and you and the services that you offer are the product. So, it’s important that I keep relevant and continually look for new opportunities to appeal to my pupils. Like every other player, it’s always a challenge to keep up with the latest rule changes!
What made you start the Pink Ladies Academy?
The Parkstone Pink Ladies Academy was created five years ago after Parkstone Golf Club identified an opportunity to grow the ladies’ game locally. We adopted the Women’s Golf Charter and now have well-defined target numbers for men, ladies and junior memberships. At the time, we were not getting a flow of new ladies to fill the membership.
Coming up through the ranks as a junior, I never really thought about a golf club being an intimidating place, but I fully recognise how it could be seen as such by ladies in their thirties, forties or fifties who are coming to the game for the first time.
The Pink Ladies established an Academy of weekly lessons for non-member ladies where they can learn golf and start to love the game, but in an environment where they don’t really get exposed to some of the aspects of club life that may be seen as intimidating. The objective is for these Pink Ladies to learn and progress to the point that they have a handicap and have demonstrated enough capability and understanding that they are ready for full membership, if they chose to do so.
In essence, the Pink Ladies Academy creates a fun, social, non-intimidating pathway for ladies to enter golf, learn the ropes with like-minded ladies and create a steady stream of new lady members into the club.
Today, I run three Pink Ladies group lessons every week, each with 10 pupils. We have now fulfilled the ladies membership number targets, and we have waiting lists for both full membership and for ladies wanting to join the Pink Ladies. The programme has been an outright success!
It is really rewarding introducing any new golfer to the game and seeing golf become an obsession and a big part of their life. It is particularly rewarding introducing women to the game, as it is typically seen as a male-dominated sport.
What has been your biggest success story?
A young school teacher called Lorraine Percy. She joined the Pink Ladies to support her mum who wanted to join the club. She had played a little bit of golf on and off through the years, but her main passion was always tennis. Very early on she showed a lot of potential and it was obvious to me that she would eventually make a very good golfer. Her first handicap was 18 in July 2021, which proved the potential she showed translated on the course. This year she became our Ladies club champion, even though she was the 10th highest handicapper in the field. Her handicap is now 8.9!
What are your ambitions for the future?
I would like to achieve higher PGA Excel status' and also strive to become a regional or eventually national coach. I would like to keep my Pink Ladies Academy growing and hopefully create more club champions!
