After more than 100 years, golf is making its return as an Olympic sport this August at Rio 2016. And no one is more excited about it than the current women’s world number one, 19-year-old Lydia Ko from New Zealand.

“When they announced that golf will be at the Olympics, I said ‘Hey, I want to get myself on that team,’” said Ko, who last year became the youngest golfer to top the world rankings, aged just 17 years and nine months old.

Ko was born in the Republic of Korea and moved to New Zealand when she was still a baby, gaining her citizenship when she was 12. Even before reaching the no.1 ranking, Ko’s prodigious talent had been turning heads in the golf world for years.

In 2012, at the  age of 14, Ko became the youngest player in the sport to win a professional tournament (Photo: Getty Images/Jamie Squire)

At the tender age of seven, Ko attracted national media attention when she competed in the 2005 New Zealand Women’s Amateur Championship and gave a good account of herself.

Aged 14, she became the youngest player in the history of the sport to win a professional tournament, clinching first place at the Bing Lee/Samsung Women's NSW Open in January 2012. In the same year she became the youngest-ever champion of an LPGA Tour event, winning the Canadian Women’s Open at just 15 years and three months old.

On turning professional in 2014 it took the young Ko just months to climb to the top of the world rankings. With her win at the Evian Championship in France in 2015, she became the youngest woman ever to win a major championship. 

Following her second major win at the ANA Inspiration tournament in April this year, Ko seems to be on track to emulating Margaret Abbott, the sport’s first and only female Olympic champion. Competing with Ko for Olympic gold in Rio will be a new generation of young players including Canadian Brooke Henderson and Republic of Korea’s Inbee Park.

Since Abbott’s win at the Paris 1900 Olympic Games, there has not been a female Olympic golf champion. The sport lost its status as an Olympic sport altogether following St Louis 1904. It was only in 2009 that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) agreed to restore golf to the Games. Rio 2016 will mark the sport's return after a hiatus of 112 years. 

The golf tournament in Rio will take place at the Olympic Golf Course in Marapendi, which was built specifically for golf’s return to the Games. After the Games, the Gil Manse-designed course will be open to the public. Organisers hope the new course will help develop the sport in Brazil and become an attraction for golf-related tourism.

Set within lush natural beauty, the Olympic Golf Course in Rio de Janeiro was built to measure for the Games. (Photo: Rio 2016)

Ko, who will tee off in Marapendi on 17 August, says she has always been a huge fan of the Olympic Games. 

Now that it is her turn to participate in the Games for the first time, she says the prospect of becoming an Olympian herself is a “dream come true.”

“If you end up getting a medal that’s great, but to say I’m an Olympian, I think that’s a pretty proud thing to say,” she said an interview with the IOC

See also

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