Sport

STUNNING: Lydia Ko Revealed A Terrible Thing About Her Life After Olympics Triumph

Published

4 months ago

August 10, 2024

Lydia Ko’s Olympic golf triumph reflects her entire life

SAINT-QUENTIN-EN-YVELINES, France — Lydia Ko merely hinted at her retirement after winning the gold medal at Le Golf National on Saturday. She doesn’t know how much longer she will play this game that has placed her on and atop the biggest stages for more than half of her 27 years on the planet. But with that gold medal around her neck that completes a personal medal trifecta for Olympic golf, she seemed certain that this will be her last Olympics. And you believe her.

But you don’t want to.

Because as gritty and as graceful as the newest member of the LPGA Hall of Fame plays this game, as much as you might miss her syrupy technique and her efficient strategic style of play in a game that seems intent on rewarding only the boldest and the brashest, what you come away with missing the most is the way this person travels. Like her tactical play down the 72nd hole, Ko seemingly glides through a life that probably seems as charmed as any. And yet you know deep down it always hasn’t been. Only someone as grounded as Ko can teach us that we are at our best when every moment isn’t only about us. That’s heady stuff when someone who knows she is the center of attention is quick to reach out for someone else.

Ko, who clearly achieved a lifetime dream with her performance—a closing one-under par 71 for a 10-under total to win by two and qualify her as the youngest member of the LPGA hall— is the kind of player—no, person—who worries more about signing golf balls for scorers and standard bearers than signing the most important scorecard of her life. She’s the kind of player— no person—who’s cheering a playing partner’s putt for eagle when she herself is about to clinch the title that should be her sole focus. She’s the kind of player—no, person—who’s seen enough to know that being consumed with the result is missing the point. She knows how big this day was, and she’s not afraid to admit that it really isn’t all that big in the grand scheme of things. Ko may still be in her 20s, but she sounds like Mother Earth.

“I struggled a little bit in middle of this year, and I felt like I had lost a little bit of direction, and it helped me realize that, ‘Hey, it potentially might not happen,’” said Ko, who bested silver medalist Esther Henseleit (66) of Germany by two and Chinese bronze medalist Xiyu Lin (69) by three.

“There were two key people that said, ‘You know what, if it doesn’t happen, it’s OK. You’ve had an unbelievable career and just because you’re in the Hall of Fame, that doesn’t make you any different.”

Ko took solace and wisdom from her husband, Jun Chung, and mother, who introduced her to the game and has guided her through ups, downs, coaches, advisors, caddies, always finding a truth that only she can know. She has had to overcome controversies with teachers and others who wanted to take her game and career in different directions, and now finds herself in the kind of place that only is stable because of experience.

“They told me whether you’re in the Hall of Fame or not, we’re still proud of you, and the things you have accomplished has been so much more than like I could have ever asked for,” Ko said. “So I think they made me realize that, ‘Hey, even if it doesn’t happen, like that’s just my fate. I’m going to do my absolute best to keep putting myself in contention and in good position going into the final days, but whether it happens or not, like I think there’s a golf god somewhere that controls it.”

There is this confident letting-go that Ko exhibits in the way she talks now that almost sounds like a kind of poetry. She knows for a time that she was the best player in the game, and yet she has the wisdom that comes from years in which she didn’t win at all. She was the No. 1 player in the world just two years ago, but failed to even make the season-ending CME Group Tour Championship the following year. Now, she’s back on the top of the mountain and yet she knows sometimes the view is what matters, not planting the flag