Jess Reid is a valuable member of our talented Pro Shop team which has gained well deserved national recognition for the contribution that they are making to coaching players of all ages and abilities. Her friendly, vivacious and energetic personality coupled with her passion in teaching and coaching the game is an important component to this success. It is testimony to her coaching ability that she has clients who travel up from Twizel regularly and some who fly all the way down from Tauranga once a month for lessons.

Jess got started in golf when she picked up her father’s golf club at the age of eight and used it to hit balls from their back lawn into a nearby equestrian park in Pauanui where the family’s labrador dog would chase the ball and return it to her. Jess found this much easier than having to take the dog for a walk!

Her father owned both the Pauanui and Whangamata golf shops and was a very capable low handicap golfer. He had studied the game through the European Golf Federation system. He always encouraged Jess and they would often play in father and daughter events. She attended St Peter’s College in Cambridge in 2005 the year that the school started a Golfing Academy as part of their programme. At this stage the school didn’t have the facilities on site for the Academy so those involved went to the Cambridge Golf Club. With the coaching she received there she started to take the game seriously and with some success.

In 2008 Jess came down to Christchurch to study a diploma in Sport and Elite Performance at Aoraki Polytechnic. The first club she joined on her arrival was Waitikiri followed by Christchurch and then she moved to Russley. Jess set herself a goal of playing for Canterbury which took a year to eventuate. Between 2010 and 2014 she played in all the major Canterbury tournaments as well as all the inter-provincials and the New Zealand Amateur at Russley where she qualified for the match play and reached the semi-final. Jess won Canterbury Golf’s Women’s Player Of The Year in 2011 and 2012 and the Liz Douglas Order Of Merit trophy three years in a row from 2010 – 2012. Her handicap was +1 at this time.

During 2012 Jess started working part time in the Pro Shop at Russley before commencing her NZPGA Professional Traineeship in 2013. During this time she found it ‘full on’ working 40 hours a week, completing assignments in the evening and playing golf on her day off. Jess enjoyed the training and found that good time management was important to handle all the work involved. She made a success of this and was awarded the NZPGA Trainee Of The Year three years in a row from 2013 – 2015.

One of the features of having Jess in the Pro Shop team has been the promotion of golf for women of all ages particularly with the She Loves Golf programme. The work that she has been involved in at Russley is featured on New Zealand Golf’s web site as a model Case Study describing how a club can take the lead in growing female participation in the sport. Recently a total of 35 attended a promotion at our club to try the game and enjoy a glass of wine. There are a number of pathways that are now available to allow the flexibility of the various membership categories and Jess has been actively encouraging players to enjoy the challenge that golf provides.

Jess enjoys being creative selecting, displaying and merchandising clothing as well as designing posters etc. The club’s new logo featuring the trees and mountains in the background that is on merchandise and letterheads etc. was designed by Jess.

An honour for Jess has been her election on to the Board of New Zealand Golf – her term finishes at the end of this year. Canterbury Golf have put her name forward for another term of three years. The Board was keen to have a female PGA professional as part of their composition and Jess has been able to capably represent the views of younger golfers. Up to 8 meetings are held each year mainly at New Zealand Golf’s headquarters at Remuera in Auckland. At times the meetings are held at other venues e.g. Queenstown where the members were provided with the opportunity to play the par 3 course at The Hills golf club.

Jess played in the recent NZPGA Charles Tour event held at Pegasus where she unfortunately missed the cut by two strokes. This was the first tournament that she has played in for three years which she really enjoyed and is now keen to play in more in the future. Phillis Meti from Auckland the world women’s longest drive champion and record holder with 377 metres and Tania Tare the world renowned trick shot golfer also from Auckland are both very good friends of Jess and she has played a number of rounds with them when she was a teenager

Another passion for Jess is polo. One of the workers in our club’s café said to Jess five years ago that she was off to play polo after work and invited her to come with her as she used to ride horses. She really enjoyed this and has played nearly every weekend since as a break from golf. This sport is only played in summer from November to March. Up until this year she has always hired horses but now she owns two. She is a member of the Port Hills Polo Club and is currently Secretary of the South Island Polo Association. Her interest in polo took her on a working holiday to Buenos Aires in Argentina in 2016, 2017 and for three months in 2018 where her father is now living. She stayed in accommodation provided at a Polo Club and her job was to get up early and prepare the 40 horses for the games later in the day.

Jess has always been keen on sports and has played tennis, basketball, touch rugby, water polo as well as skiing and athletics. Now she plays tennis in the summer and skis in the winter.

We are most fortunate that Jess has returned to Russley and our Pro Shop team. They all work well together sharing ideas and using technology to capture video etc. of their clients’ swings so that they can provide the best quality advice. With the calibre of our coaching staff, excellent practice facilities and the new indoor golf simulator under construction as part of the Pro Shop our club will soon be providing a service second to none in New Zealand. We really appreciate what Jess and the team do to promote our club and golf.