The danger attached to Lydia Ko is that youthfulness is forgotten because of continuing success. And what a shame that would be; the New Zealander’s brilliance when still aged only 18 should set her apart as a genuine sporting phenomenon. When earlier burdened by expectation, she did not wilt, to the point where she is now the No1 ranked player in the world.
This weekend, it is not just the European Tour that will reach its season conclusion. The juncture is the same on the LPGA Tour, where Ko and South Korea’s Inbee Park – a relative veteran at 27 – have more than just the CME Group Tour Championship to play for.
The LPGA player of the year trophy remains up for grabs. The Vare Trophy for best scoring average likewise; Park leads Ko by just 0.16 on that front. The overall money list? Ko is ahead by $2,758,417 (£1.8m) to $2,570,096 with a $500,000 closing tournament first prize at stake. The Race to the CME Globe, an offshoot of the FedEx play-off points system, carries a $1.5m bonus and is also still to be decided. Stacy Lewis, like Ko and Park, would be guaranteed the bounty should she win in Naples, Florida.
Ko knows which piece of silverware she would cherish the most. “Player of the year,” she says. “Because I definitely didn’t expect that coming into this year. One of my big goals was to play a little bit more consistently. Last year it was much better than I would have ever expected. This year is the same. But just coming through this year, I think consistency was really the biggest goal that our team worked around, and to know that you’re the player and you’ve played consistent all year and you’ve done these points to get here, I think that would definitely mean a lot.
“But any award or just to know that, hey, I’ve won five times on Tour and I’ve had so many top 10s, I think it’s great. So that’s why I feel like, hey, even if it doesn’t exactly go the way I would love it to by the end of Sunday, I think I’ve just got to be pleased and proud with the way this year has gone.”
And some. Park too has enjoyed a stunning year, claiming two major championships, but has inevitably been overshadowed by Ko. The New Zealander’s 2015 opened with a win at the Australian Open, from which there has been little let-up; Ko also claimed the Swinging Skirts LPGA Classic, Canadian Pacific Women’s Open and that elusive major, the Evian Championship, before letting a 54-hole lead slip away for the first time in her professional career at the KEB Hana Bank Championship in South Korea, the country where she was born and from where her family emigrated when she was an infant.
The response? A nine-shot success in Taiwan a week later. Ko has displayed tenacity as well as golf which batters opponents into submission, as illustrated by two play-off wins this year – and hardly against soft opponents either, given the achievements of Lewis and Morgan Pressel.
It is not unreasonable to suggest that, were Ko in another sport or perhaps of alternative nationality, her profile would be considerably higher. Were her gender different, she would certainly be wealthier; picking up less than $3m for five tournament wins in top level men’s golf in the USA would be laughed at as a prospect. Hopefully Ko’s continued brilliance can go some way to altering that disparity.
Ko and Park – both born in Seoul – are differentiated by contrasting golf swings but united by stunning short games. By Park’s own acknowledgement, both are “poker‑faced” when in battle. “The most scary thing about Lydia is she’s so similar to me,” adds the Korean. “I can’t really see that much difference with me. I don’t know what her plan is and what she’s thinking, but it’s almost the same as me.”
Ko’s focus is not solely about hitting golf balls. What other explanation is there for a willingness to study, via her native land, in tandem with her career, other than Ko believing the understanding of her own mind could be of benefit when chasing titles?
“It’s tough, but we try and juggle it,” she explains. “I know the professors have been trying to make it easy for me, trying to give all the stuff that I need to read and then to do these assignments. I feel very fortunate that I’ve been getting that great support from Korea University.
“But golf enough is tough, so to juggle both is very tough. I’ve always been interested in doing college and expanding my studies because if not, I’m kind of a lazy person where if I don’t have something to do, I’d lie down all day, watch TV and get told off by Mom and then go eat and then watch TV.
“It’s good to have something that I’ve got to do and I think studying psychology is great because I get to learn about myself and get to learn about everybody else.”
On the subject of this week, and an event Ko won last year, she is typically relaxed. “I’m just going to try and enjoy it and have the same mindset as last year,” she says. “I have had two weeks off no I feel fresh coming into this week.
“But this is the last event of the season, and I can’t believe that it’s nearly the end of my second year on Tour. It’s been a really fun season, had a lot of great things happening and things that really surprised me along the way, too.”
There is no shock at all attached to Ko’s enduring brilliance, testament in itself to how a teenage prodigy has risen to the top of her sport.
