LOS ANGELES – Life is good for Lauren Coughlin this week. She’s got her Pearl Jam and Metallica tunes, caffeine from Flo Coffee Bar, and she just made her first U. S. Women’s Open cut. She didn’t just get in, either.
She shot a second-round, three-under 68 Friday to put herself in the hunt at riviera Country Club MORE: Riviera produced a very differnt ‘bonus’ goodbye for Michelle Wie West“Pretty happy about that,” Coughlin said. “I’ve only played three, so it’s not like its been that many, but still.
I played really, really great golf today. Hit a lot of really good shots. Putted extremely well.
Made a lot of four-, six-footers for par when I really needed to, so I’m excited for the weekend.”Coughlin–ranked 14th in the world–teed off on No. 10 and birdied three of the first four holes. At two-under total, she was two shots off the lead when she finished in the morning wave.
The 33-year-old coughlin is a three-time LPGA Tour winner, and she has five professional wins, so she knows how to close things out. She already had experience playing at Riviera. Lawrence Coben, the former CEO of NRG–one of Coughlin’s sponsors–is a member here, so she played with him two years ago.
That helped, too. NRG sponsored her hotel in Santa Monica, where she and her husband, John Pond–who caddies for Gina Kim– are staying. And now, coughlin will try to continue to do what she does best–stay calm and use so many of her outside interests to lean on to get away from the stress of golf.2280055838Lauren Coughlin laughs with her caddie Jack Fulgham.
Ryan Sirius Sun“She’s chill,” said Jack Fulgham, the caddie with whom she started working this season. “She doesn’t get mad.”Coughlin bogeyed two of the holes on the front nine–her back–but birdied the ninth hole to end the round on a great note. After that on Friday, she was set to go to Flo Coffee to get another caffeinated beverage.
She loves to spend time researching coffee houses before every tournament stop. Coughlin missed the cut at her two previous tournaments before coming to Riviera, but she also won the Aramco Championship in April. There’s probably a song in one of her play lists that she can turn to during the ups and downs of professional golf and life.
She landed on Metallica when she was driving to a tournament during the pandemic. She was in her old car from high school and listening to a random radio station.“It didn’t have a super fancy radio, so I was just listening to whatever radio station was on. And the song came on, and I was like, ‘Who is this?’ I’d never heard it.
It was a really good song,” Coughlin said. “It was ‘The Unforgiven’ by Metallica. And so I was, like, ‘Oh, this is really good.’ That wasn’t really what I pictured.
So I did a deep dive, and I just fell in love with them. And then pearl Jam, kind of a little bit similar.”She’s now seen Pearl Jam in concert three times and Metallica twice. She had a chance encounter with Metallica lead guitarist Kirk Hammett when she spotted him in a Hawaii airport in baggage claim.
She has a lime green memento from that brief introduction, and she has it with her here at Riviera, too.“It took me 15 minutes to work up the courage to introduce myself,” Coughlin said. “I waited until his luggage was coming out. He was being nice, but I could tell he was trying to get his baggage and I said sorry, then I just kind of ran away.
He called me back and gave me the guitar pick.”Perhaps that’s the good luck charm she needs to be the first American to win the U. S. Women’s Open since Allisen Corpuz won in 2023 at Pebble Beach. That, and a good coffee.
