by Tom Cade, Editor

For Kim Shek and Adithi Anand, it was camaraderie and a shared competitiveness, as Shek made a deep run at the 2024 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur, with Anand as her caddie during the national championship held in late September at Broadmoor Golf Club in Seattle.

The first time the two met, they were paired together by chance at a round at Sahalee Country Club in Sammamish, Wash. “It was pouring rain,” Anand said. “Miserable. But we became friends from that point on. I was still in high school at the time.”

Anand was in the midst of a remarkable run during her high school years. She won the 2018 Washington Junior State Championship, finished as the individual runner-up in the 2017 and 2019 WIAA 4A State Championship, and helped her Redmond High School girls’ golf team win the 2019 WIAA 4A State team title.

Anand’s family are members at Sahalee, and Shek has been a member at that club for six years. Shek is now the club’s vice president. “She has been so supportive of the club’s women’s division,” Anand said. “And she’s been such an inspiration for all the players.”

Shek has been playing golf for just 16 years, not picking up the game until her late 30s. “I got into the game because my brothers convinced me to do it,” she says. “I didn’t play any junior golf, didn’t play any tournaments, none of that.”

Now 52, Shek has quickly elevated her game to the top level. She is a four-time club champion at Sahalee, and two-time senior club champion. She has won back-to-back Washington Senior Women’s Amateur titles (2023, 2024), and was named the 2022 and 2023 Washington Golf Senior Women’s Player of the Year.

Shek has qualified for two U.S. Senior Women’s Opens (2022, 2024), and this year is the second U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur Championships she has qualified for.

Anand has gone on to play on the women’s golf team at the University of Washington. With Broadmoor being one of the home clubs for the team, Anand has had the chance to play the course many times, so Shek asked her to be her caddie during the national championship.

“We get to play Broadmoor every Tuesday,” she said. “It is very different playing the course for practice than it is for this championship (the U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur). The rough is so much thicker, the tee boxes that were used were different every day of the championship. Kim definitely knows her own game, so I was there really just as her support.”

For Shek, she was just happy to be there at all. “I came into this championship without expectations,” she said after her quarterfinal loss to Ellen Port. “I was surprised that I made it this far. Ellen is such a good player, and was so good around the greens. It is no surprise she has done what she has in her career. To compete against her was an amazing experience.”

Port has won three U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur titles, four U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur titles, played on two Curtis Cup teams, and also captained the victorious 2014 U.S. Curtis Cup team.

By making it to the quarterfinals of this year’s championship, Shek has earned an exemption into next year’s U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur, which will be held at The Omni Homestead Resort in Hot Springs, Va.

And of her caddie, Shek says with a laugh, “I can still give her a run for her money on the course.”