Nelly Korda to defend her gold medal at Paris 2024

Korda becomes the first player since Park In-bee in 2013 to win six times in a single season. GETTY IMAGES

Korda will defend her title at Le Golf National, coming off an impressive streak of five consecutive LPGA Tour victories earlier this year. Her remarkable performance has made her a standout player in the tournament.

World number one Korda continued her remarkable year, clinching her sixth win on the LPGA Tour with victory at the Mizuho Americas Open at Liberty National.

Korda’s place as one of the sport’s most prominent and popular figures was already secure at the start of 2024, but a superlative solo season has seen the 25-year-old rise to new heights. It began in her home town of Bradenton, Florida in January, a play-off victory over Lydia Ko in the Drive-On Championship sparking a remarkable run.

It was the first of five successive victories on the LPGA Tour, a run that encompassed four wins in five weekends in March and April and a second major title at the Chevron Championship. That Texas triumph emulated the streaks of Annika Sorenstam and Nancy Lopez. The setbacks soon came, missed cuts at the next two majors, in a notoriously unpredictable sport but Korda had established herself again as the LPGA’s dominant force.

Sporting success runs in the family. Father Petr Korda was a regular Grand Slam challenger in the late 1990s, winning the 1998 Australian Open, while mother Regina Rajchrtova reached the world’s top 30 in her own impressive career on the court. Younger brother Sebastian followed his parents into the tennis trade and is threatening the top ten; elder sister Jessica has six LPGA Tour titles on a crowded mantelpiece at the Korda family home.

The LPGA Tour win

Korda duelled with Australian Hannah Green throughout the final round in Jersey City but Green made bogey on the final hole. Her one-under round of 71 was enough for the one stroke victory.

The 25-year-old American missed out on what would have been a record sixth straight title at the Founders Cup last week. But despite a shaky front nine, where she made three bogeys and a birdie, Korda recovered with birdies on the 10th, 13th and 15th. It came down to the final hole with the leading pair level, Green found the left rough after pulling her tee shot while Korda safely hit the fairway.

Green’s second shot ended in the rough by the greenside bunker and she then found the green but left herself a 15-foot putt. Korda’s putt for birdie was just inches away, leaving Green to make her putt to force a playoff which the Australian was unable to do as she made bogey.

“Oh my gosh, six, I mean, I just can’t even really gather myself now after that head-to-head that Hannah and I had pretty much all day,” Korda said. “It wasn’t my best stuff out there today but fought really hard on the back nine”.

“I feel like you never have your A-game throughout an entire tournament. You kind of have to grind through it even with your B, C, and D game. I definitely felt like I had my C and D game today. Didn’t really play that well,” she added.

“Just told myself that even though I was 2-over, I still had opportunities on the back nine to take the lead or to battle with Hannah, because she was playing solid golf.”

Korda becomes the first player since Park In-bee in 2013 to win six times in a single season and is the first American to do so since Beth Daniel won seven titles in 1990. She matched Annika Sorenstam and Nancy Lopez for the all-time record win streak of five when she won last month’s Chevron Championship.

She started her historic victory run at January’s Drive On Championship in her hometown of Bradenton, Florida, then took a break before winning three times in as many weeks, at March’s Seri Pak and Ford championships and in April’s Match Play tournament.



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