After 18 years on the Ladies European Tour (LET) and on her 292nd start, Wales’ Lydia Hall fired the lowest round of her professional career on day one at the Tipsport Czech Ladies Open carding a sensational 63 (-9) to lead by one shot.
On a low scoring Friday at Royal Beroun Golf Club, the one-time LET winner carded eight birdies and one eagle to better Blanca Fernandez’s morning target by one and lead the way in the Czech Republic.
The scorching scorecard included a birdie finish at the par-5 18th and just one dropped shot as Hall continued her excellent recent form.
“It was just a solid performance,” Hall said, whose sole victory on the circuit came back in 2012. “I got off to a nice start hitting a really close shot to 12-feet. Unfortunately I missed that but from then on I gave myself some nice chances coming in and holed some nice putts. All round, if you’re shooting that, everything was pretty good today.
“As an overall player, I think mentally I’ve grown massively over the last three or four years. I’ve worked more on the psychology side of thinks and I’d say my game is probably better than it’s ever been.”
Hall finished T3 at last month’s Jabra Ladies Open de France and T18 at last week’s Dutch Ladies Open. She also won on the WPGA Tour of Australasia earlier this year claiming the Vic Open. Having joined the LET back in 2008, the 38-year-old remains as competitive as ever and is hungry to earn win number two on the LET this week.
“Absolutely,” Hall said on the prospect of triumphing again. “I want the second, third, fourth and more. I definitely think there’s a lot more to come, hence why I’m still here 18 years in. I just want to be in a position where I can compete in the larger events.”
In a tie for third on eight-under par include the before-mentioned Fernandez as well as Switzerland’s Vanessa Knecht and England’s Esme Hamilton. The latter finished runner-up at this event in 2025 before winning this year’s Investec SA Women’s Open.
While clearly an admirer of the course, the scorecard is mightily impressive given Hamilton withdrew from last week’s Dutch Ladies Open with a finger injury following a freak accident in the Netherlands.
“I’m really happy with the round,” Hamilton said, who went bogey-free and carded 30 shots on her back-nine, the course’s front-nine. “I didn’t really know if I was going to be able to play this week with the random injury last week. But it’s all good. I’m just very happy to be back with good vibes. I just wanted to enjoy it out there today and I feel like I did that.”
One back in a tie for fifth sit another of last year’s runners-up, Spain’s Luna Sobron Galmes, plus English rookie Charlotte Heath, home favourite Sara Kouskova and Finland’s Noora Komulainen.
Sobron Galmes is sharing an apartment with compatriot Fernandez this week and incredibly, the pair matched today’s score during a practice competition yesterday at Royal Beroun Golf Club.
“Yesterday we played a match and it was heat!” Fernandez said, now in her second year on the LET. “We were holing everything. On the last hole, the 18th, Luna birdied and I beat her by one. She shot seven-under and I got eight-under [the same as today].”
Five players round out the top-10 in a tie for ninth on six-under par, a group which includes Germany’s Patricia Isabel Schmidt, Italy’s Alessandra Fanali, New Zealand’s Momoka Kobori and India’s Diksha Dagar – a winner here in 2023.
A total of 95 players went under par on a blistering hot day in Beroun. The second round of the Tipsport Czech Ladies Open gets underway tomorrow morning at 7:45 local time.
Follow all the action throughout the tournament on our socials – @LETgolf on Instagram, TikTok and X, and Ladies European Tour on YouTube and Facebook – #TipsportCzechLadiesOpen.
