Home comforts are a rare novelty for Anna Foster. So far this year, the 24-year-old Dubliner has crisscrossed the globe – competing in tournaments in 13 countries, from Australia to the United States to South Africa and more recently in Europe. This week’s KPMG Irish Women’s Open at The K Club comes with that rarity of her own bed.Not that Foster is complaining about the schedule. Far from it. The travel demands are part and parcel of life as a tour professional. In only her second season on the Ladies European Tour (LET), Foster – most recently runner-up to England’s Eleanor Givens in the Swiss Open – has hit the ground running and adapted well.That runners-up finish in Switzerland has been the high point so far, a result that elevated her to 34th on the LET order of merit and secured her tour card for next season with a large chunk of the schedule yet to navigate. It is a good place to be in, and Foster is keen to kick on and turn contention into wins.Anna Foster feels she is up to speed with the standards of the Ladies European Tour. Photograph: Dan Sheridan/Inpho As an amateur – which included two Irish Close Championship wins and Home Internationals success with Ireland – Foster was honoured with All-American selection (when playing for Auburn University on the US collegiate circuit). That grounding has served her well in adapting to professional life on the LET, with the future ambition to play regularly on the LPGA Tour.“My first year on tour last year, it was more just about finding my feet and getting comfortable with the lifestyle and everything,” she says. “But this year, especially seeing your peers win, you definitely want to experience that. And being in contention, it makes you really want it.“And that’s what we’re all striving for, to win. That feeling when you win is such a high and [it] keeps you coming back. It just comes down to that week. You know, if you get the bounces . . . you need kind of everything to go in your favour to win.”Certainly, Foster knocked on the door in Switzerland in her most recent outing on the LET a fortnight ago. She will hope to carry that momentum to The K Club, with the Irish Open being staged on the Palmer South course. It’s a familiar layout to her having made a number of advance visits.“I practise a good bit at The K Club, mostly on the other course, but I still play the South course enough times to know my way around,” Foster says. “I’ve been able to play it more times this summer with some of the other girls and just getting comfortable out there and getting a few lines off the tees and different kinds of strategies. “It’s an event I’m really looking forward to. It’s great to be able to stay at home and to be able to have all my friends and family come out. So that’s really exciting. It’s probably one of the biggest crowds that we get all year. It’s great to play in front of crowds and we love to feed off the crowds.”Foster’s all-round game is strong. “I’d say that I’m always giving myself birdie chances,” she adds. “Ball striking would be a strength of my game – I’m fairly confident in it and I’m always working on my short game.Anna Foster goes for a putt during the 2025 Irish Open at Carton House. Photograph: Laszlo Geczo/Inpho “I think the most important part of the game for me is the mental side of it and just being really clear about what I’m trying to do each day. And I think at our level, things like that really make that tiny difference, which is kind of where we’re searching for that 0.5 per cent here and there. It’s really small margins.”Expanding on the mental side of the game, Foster added: “I’ve been lucky to work with lots of great sports psychologists the whole way up through amateur and in the States as well. My coach, Gavin Lunny, he would help me a lot on the mental side of it. And Karl Morris in the UK as well, he’s someone I recently started working with.“I think it’s such an important part of the game, especially at our level, being really clear on what you’re trying to do each day. Especially in high-intensity environments, when in contention and that sort of thing. It’s so important.”Down the line, that lure of the LPGA Tour will undoubtedly call louder. For now, it’s about working her way along on the LET.“This year has shown me that my game isn’t that far off that LPGA level and it’s definitely something I would want to do. It’s just [about] when the time is right. I think I would like to become more comfortable on the LET first and, you know, hopefully strive for wins and being in contention. And then I feel like I’d be in a position to maybe go to the States.”For now, all her focus is on the Irish Open.Anna Foster was speaking as a Pinergy brand ambassador ahead of competing in the KPMG Irish Women’s Open at The K Club, starting on Thursday.