MEMPHIS, Tenn — Less than 2% of collegiate athletes go pro, so to have the option to do so, and choose not to, is always a surprise.
Rachel Heck is one of the most accomplished golfers to come out of the Memphis area, one that was projected to be seen on the LPGA tour one day. Her collegiate career taught her that there is more to her than her ability to swing a club and that is what she wants to explore in her next chapter.
"When I was three years old, if you asked me what I wanted to be, it was a professional golfer always," Heck said.
If anybody could have done it, it would have been Heck. The Memphis native and St. Agnes Academy graduate was a four-time individual high school state champion. As a freshman at Stanford, she won individual championships at the conference, regional and national level, becoming just the third woman to do so. She even played the U.S. Women's Open as an amateur.
For most, going pro would have been a foregone conclusion. Not for Heck.
"My senior year of high school, I kind of figured out that I needed something more in my life than golf because up until then, it was just my sole purpose in life was to be the best golfer ever," Heck said. "And then I realized that that was so not enough."
She began searching for meaning beyond the game and found it in the United States military. While still a college athlete, Heck joined the Air Force ROTC as a freshman.
"I definitely had no idea how that was going to work with golf and academics, but I figured I just tried to make it happen. I got so lucky that I had the best coaches, the best Air Force officers, holding my hand through it all," she said.
Adversity hit soon after. After a stellar freshman season, illness and injury held Heck out her sophomore and junior postseasons.
As a junior, she was diagnosed with thoracic outlet syndrome, a nerve-related injury that affects the area between the ribs and collarbone. In March 2023, she had surgery to remove a rib. Hazards seemed to be stacking up in life, even they were not on the golf course.
Those hazards helped to solidify an internal decision she had been battling for years prior. In March 2024, her senior year, Heck penned a letter detailing a decision not to pursue a pro career in golf.
"I prayed on it a lot, like this is not what I want to do. I don't want to be on the road week after week. I want to come home to my bed, my family at night. I don't really want to life in the in the spotlight," she said. "I think there's so much more to life and for me, I realized that I wanted to explore those other options instead of just solely narrowing in on golf."
The accomplished golfer did not go into the night quietly.
Stanford won their second team championship in three years in May. Heck was the clinching point, a storybook ending to an enchanting golf career.
"I couldn't have scripted it any better and I mean, I'll forever be grateful for that. That's one to tell the kids," Heck said. "It just seems too perfect. Like real life doesn't work out that way and this time it did somehow."
Now that her collegiate story is done, Heck will go pro in something other than sports. In June, she was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the United States Air Force. Robert Heck, her father who had been her golf caddy so often as a child, pinned her at the ceremony along with her mother.
Heck will work as a public affairs officer for the Air Force Reserves based out of Los Angeles and also in finance at a private equity firm, KKR. She says she’ll still pursue golf on the amateur level and would love to work with kids in junior golf.
If golf has taught her anything, it's that she can do anything.
"It's just a game. It's a wonderful game, and it'll give you so much. But at the end of the day, it's your life and you're strong enough to bet on yourself and pave your own path," Heck said.