Golf was not Jan’s first love. Before the fairways claimed her, she was an accomplished lacrosse player, representing South Australia several times.
Jovial yet fiercely competitive, Jan Dale-Harris came to golf through the best possible influence: her father, Max Dale, a prominent golfer and State Amateur Champion who became her lifelong coach and mentor.
It was a coach-player relationship that blossomed into a considerably charmed golf career for the student, his daughter.
Golf was not Jan’s first love. Before the fairways claimed her, she was an accomplished lacrosse player, representing South Australia several times.
Taking up golf in the late 1970s, she announced herself emphatically in 1983, then playing as Jan Dale, by winning the State Amateur title.
That year stands out as particularly dominant.
Not only claiming the State title, she reached the Australian Amateur final at Royal Perth. It was her second consecutive appearance, having gone down 5 and 4 to Corinne Dibnah at Royal Queensland two years earlier.
This time she faced four-time champion Sandra McCaw in a monumental 36-hole battle, eventually going down on the final hole.
Returning to the State Amateur title in 1986, now competing as Jan Dale-Harris, she claimed three consecutive championships through to 1988, and reached the final on nine occasions in total across her career.
Through the mid to late 1980s, Jan Dale Harris was at her best, claiming a rare achievement by a South Australian, the Victorian Amateur title, along the way.
Ebullient, skilled and relentlessly focused, Jan represented South Australia and Australia across numerous interstate and international competitions. She also won the Australian Foursomes Championship twice, partnering fellow South Australians, Cathy Symons and Anne-Marie Knight respectively.
In her early 70s, the competitor in her had not abated, and playing off a 5 handicap and belonging to that rare club of Glenelg members who have called the course home for more than 50 years.
