Pebble Beach, Calif. — The last putt of the 2025 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship dropped just before the sun did, a curling 18-footer that rolled perfectly into the heart of the cup. When it fell, Ina Kim-Schaad raised her arms, smiled toward the Pacific, and closed one of the most remarkable chapters in amateur golf — again.
At 42, the former collegiate standout turned finance professional captured her second U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur title, winning a record-setting 23-hole final over Hanley Long at Monterey Peninsula Country Club’s Dunes Course. The win came six years after her first championship at Forest Highlands in Arizona — and nearly two decades after she once walked away from the game entirely.
From Promising Junior to an Unexpected Pause
Kim-Schaad’s golf story began in Los Angeles, where she and her sister Hana picked up the game under their parents’ encouragement. By her teens, Ina had become one of the nation’s top juniors, highlighted by a runner-up finish in the 2000 U.S. Girls’ Junior Championship at Pumpkin Ridge. A scholarship to Northwestern University followed, where she captained the Wildcats women’s golf team and studied communications and business.
But when graduation came in 2005, so did a career pivot. “I loved golf, but I wanted to see what else was out there,” she once reflected. She put down her clubs, moved into finance, and built a global résumé with stops in Chicago, London, Hong Kong, and New York. Golf became a memory — a hobby she’d left behind with no regrets.
The Return — and a New Perspective
That all changed when she met Ian Schaad, now her husband and caddie. An avid golfer himself, he encouraged her to play again “just for fun.” One casual round became another. The old rhythm returned — and so did the competitive spark. “He asked me to come play on the weekends,” she recalled. “And that’s when I got that golf bug again.”
By 2016, she was back in tournaments. Her comeback began with a victory at the Metropolitan Golf Association Women’s Amateur, then again in 2018 and 2019. That same year, she completed her national comeback with her first U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur title — an achievement that reintroduced her to the broader golf world as a player reborn.
A Champion Once More
Fast forward to 2025, and the game came full circle. Competing just miles from where she was married, Kim-Schaad’s second Mid-Am win required patience, endurance, and no shortage of mental toughness. Over six days and 144 holes, she outlasted some of the best mid-amateur players in the world on one of the country’s most scenic — and demanding — stages.
In the final, she and Long traded blows all afternoon, neither willing to break. When both bogeyed the 18th, they returned to the tee for sudden death — a duel that stretched five holes deep. On the 23rd, Kim-Schaad poured in her winning birdie and raised her putter in quiet disbelief. It was the longest championship final in U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur history.
“I knew it would be a war of attrition,” she said afterward. “You couldn’t play aggressively on those pins — it was about staying patient and letting the round come to you.”
The Legacy Grows
With the victory, Kim-Schaad becomes the sixth player to win multiple U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur titles and the first since Julia Potter-Bobb in 2016. She also earns an exemption into the 2026 U.S. Women’s Open at Riviera Country Club — fittingly back in her home state of California.
What makes her story resonate beyond the record books is what it represents: balance, rediscovery, and perspective. A player who once left the game for a decade, only to return as one of its most inspiring figures. “Super proud,” she said afterward. “Today is just icing on the cake.”
For Kim-Schaad, golf isn’t just a competitive outlet anymore — it’s a second life. And at Monterey Peninsula, she proved that even after time away, true love for the game never really fades.
