Kimberly Dinh returned to competitive golf with a different perspective.
“I don’t live and die with every shot like in college,” said the recent 28-year-old Michigan Women’s Amateur Champion.
“I take the bad shots as they come and don’t let them bother me as much as they did before. It’s perspective. Golf is not the end of the world now. I try and take it all in and then trust my game, trust that I can score without putting too much pressure on myself.”
Dinh played college golf at the University of Wisconsin, made a few runs in the Women’s Amateur in the summers during school, set a course record (62 on Mountain Ridge course) in the 2014 Michigan Women’s Open at Crystal Mountain, and then went off to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) for five years of graduate work and zero competitive golf.
She came home in 2020 with the promise of her current job, as a Senior Research Specialist for Dow Chemical in her hometown of Midland.
“I came home last year and I wasn’t starting the job until August, so I had some time to play golf,” she said. “I found you can come back to competitive golf. I started working with a swing coach recommended by a friend and I won the (GAM Women’s Mid-Amateur). I enjoyed competing again and winning was fun and I had the new perspective.”
After winning the recent Women’s Amateur played at Saginaw Country Club, Dinh admitted the tournament had always been on her bucket list.
“This was always one of my goals and I never quite got it done when I was in high school and college and playing all the time,” she said. “I didn’t think I would play in it after that just because of everything else, but here I am and it’s amazing.”
Dinh worked here way through two rounds of stroke play, then five matches including the final, a tense 1-up win over 19-year-old University of Michigan golfer Mikaela Schulz of West Bloomfield.
Dinh made a six-foot birdie putt on the par 4 No. 16 hole off a 54-degree wedge shot to tie the match for the final time and then won on No. 18 with a pressure-packed par.
“The match could have gone either way,” Dinh said. “We were pretty much trading shot for shot and ultimately it was going to come down to who was going to make the shot at the right moment.”
Schulz said Dinh hit the critical shots down the stretch, especially the approach at 16.
“She couldn’t have hit it much better,” she said. “It was a tough, tough match. She just doesn’t make mistakes.”
Dinh has been working with Kyle Martin, the head golf professional at The Fortress in Frankenmuth, and he caddied for her in the title match taking over for her father.
“His teaching style and my playing style connected and it has been great,” she said. “In college my strength was my short game and putting. Ball-striking has always been the weakest part of my game, but I’m getting better at hitting more consistent shots. I’m a better wedge player now that when I graduated from Wisconsin.”
Dinh said she balances work and golf these days with a little bit of practice on the right things after work, and sometimes on weekends, too.
“I have some experience with this method because when I played college golf I was always working internships full-time in the summer and still trying to compete in tournaments. I found a way to keep my game sharp, so what I do now is not new to me. It’s just been a while since I had to do it.”
Dinh is the daughter of Paul and Mai Dinh and has two siblings. She said she isn’t all work and golf. She is family oriented, likes to cook, especially baking bread, and she has taken to playing Ultimate Frisbee, too.
“I like to be active,” she said.
She also thinks she is helping prove you can return to golf.
“I know a lot of women golfers leave the game after college, but you can come back,” she said. “Stacy (Slobodnik-Stoll, the Michigan State University women’s golf coach and the state’s winningest amateur) always inspired me. She’s a great example of balancing all the other things she does with still being a good player.”
The recent Michigan Amateur win proved Dinh is still a good player.
“In reflection, I was a solid college player, but just solid,” she said. “I had never won a (Golf Association of Michigan) tournament until last year. Winning the Amateur is really nice validation that I’m one of the best players in the state.”