[Photo: Andrew Wevers]
Dewi Weber enjoyed a feel-good finish last week at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship. Her best performance in three previous major starts was a T-30, but at Hazeltine National, the 30-year-old from the Netherlands tied for third. That earned her $US752,089, doubling her career LPGA earnings.
FROM THE VAULT: Dutch golfer denied Olympic spot is making a BIG statement
Afterwards, Weber, who moved up 128 spots in the Rolex Rankings to 82nd with her Women’s PGA showing, talked about how she was hoping the finish would help her bid to make the European team for this year’s Solheim Cup, which is being played in her home country just outside Amsterdam. But this week she discovered that that dream will required a few more hurdles to clear.
In order for a player to make the European side, she must have membership on the Ladies European Tour, something that Weber does not. Additionally, membership is needed not just to make the team as an automatic qualifier but also as a captain’s pick should Anna Nordqvist want to pick the Dutchwoman to help bolster the galleries.
“I did not know that you had to have that,” Weber told Skratch Golf. “So that’s something that I’ve been made aware of.”
With the competition approaching in September, time is running out. There are three events remaining on the LET schedule during the qualifying period – including next week’s Amundi Evian Championship – and Weber says she has to win one of them in order to be eligible for immediate member status.
“I mean, the goal is very clear. It’s not easy, obviously. I’ve never done that (win) before; there’s plenty of people that have never done that before and that’s OK. But the goal is very clear: I would love to play Solheim Cup and the fact that it’s in my home country. I would love nothing more, but I need to play well.”
If this all sounds familiar, a similar situation took place in 2021 with Finland’s Matilda Castren. That year she won the Mediheal Championship to become the first Finn to win an LPGA event. She was also at the time the only European player to have won on the LPGA Tour that season. But she wasn’t an LET member and had to win a LET-sanctioned event to break through, which she wound up doing at the Grant Ladies open in Finland that July. Castren went on to be the first Finnish golfer to play in the Solheim Cup and went 3-1 at Inverness that year.
Representing her country has been a challenge for Weber. In 2024, she qualified to compete in the Olympics in Paris, but her Rolex Ranking of 336th caused the Dutch Olympic Committee to say she couldn’t not play, believing she did not have a realistic chance at winning.
