Kelsey Bennett heads into the Jabra Ladies Open de France after a runner-up finish in Morocco last week.
The Australian led at the 18 and 36-hole marks at the Lalla Meryem Cup but came up just short finishing one stroke behind winner Anna Huang.
Though Bennett, who secured her maiden LET title at the Australian Women’s Classic earlier this year, was slightly disappointed with her finish she was still pleased with her performance in Morocco.
“That was good and it was awesome to be in a position of holding the lead for literally the majority of the tournament,” she said. “Obviously, I’m a little disappointed not to get the win.
“But if you told me second place at the start of the week, I probably would have been pretty happy with it. It’s all learning to be in those positions. It’s great. You can never complain about being in contention that’s for sure.”
After winning in March, Bennett has made the cut in three of her next five events with her best result T21 at the Women’s Australian Open.
She missed the inaugural MCB Ladies Classic – Mauritius to go back to Australia and work on her game; however, that seems to have paid off with a T20 in Germany and runner-up finish in Morocco.
“I missed Mauritius to have a couple of weeks at home to reset, which I think worked out well. Germany and last week were pretty good,” she explained.
“I’m keen to just get through this week and then heading back home. I’m probably going to miss Dutch, so should have three weeks at home, which would be really nice. It’s looking like I’m going to be in Evian at the moment. This would be good prep for that. A little reset at home and then I’ll be ready.”
This week sees the 12th event of the Ladies European Tour (LET) season with the Jabra Ladies Open de France held at Evian Resort Golf Club.
Bennett, who is currently fourth in the LET Order of Merit, will be hoping to be here again in July at the fourth major of the year – especially with fellow Aussie Grace Kim being the defending champion after her miraculous chip-in last year.
“It’s absolutely beautiful here,” added Bennett. “We’re staying in the hotel where you can see the water and have a pretty good view, so that’s really nice. I played this last year and it’s just really cool.
“It’s just one of those places where you can’t wait to go there. You know what I mean? So, and then to be able to see it in Evian championship conditions, it’s going to be very different to this week. It’ll be a whole new challenge and another thing to look forward to.
“[On Grace Kim] I just remember watching it on TV and thinking in Jabra, I hit it in that water too, and then she holed the chip and I thought I didn’t do that. Seeing an Aussie that I’ve grown up with be such a superstar and do something so amazing, it’s really cool to see and watch and hopefully one day I can do the same.
“Three of us are staying together. A few of us have spread out, but we’re planning on a little Aussie dinner at some stage. It’s really cool. We have Whipper [Whitner Hillier] here and I grew up watching her and now I can call her my friend – she might disagree – just be able to play alongside her. It’s so special to have so many Aussies out here.
“I’m just going to keep doing what I’m doing. Mark and I have a pretty good system going at the moment. Obviously, the goal is to be in contention again over the weekend and we’ll see how we go.”
Bennett will tee it up in the first round of the Jabra Ladies Open de France at 9.06 am (local time) alongside Germany’s Alexandra Försterling and France’s Emma Falcher.
Keep up to date with all the action throughout on our socials – @LETgolf on Instagram, TikTok and X, and Ladies European Tour on YouTube and Facebook – #JabraLadiesOpenDeFrance.
