Nelly Korda wins Olympic gold medal in women’s golf

The weather in the last round was overcast from the morning and happened in accordance with the forecast – heavy rain for two days of the weekend. But after an hour of hiatus due to bad weather, the women’s 72-hole individual content still closed the curtain and completed the golf medal match on its own schedule.

To ensure progress with 60 players, the Organizing Committee arranged two starting points for the closing match – hole 1 and hole 10, each group consisted of three people, starting at 6:30 a.m., with each turn of hole 1 before the hole. 10 five minutes. Korda went from the first hole, in the last leg with Lydia Ko (New Zealand) and Aditi Ashok (India). In this group at the beginning of the round, Korda held the top of the table at -15, leading Ashok by three strokes, five strokes from Ko.

The organizers blew the whistle to pause the round, when they had not finished hole 16.

At the end of 17 holes, Korda went to -17, still leading but with a one-stroke advantage due to five birdies, one bogey and one double bogey. At this time, only Ko and the host golfer Mone Inami still have a golden picture with Korda.

Inami was two holes ahead, finishing at -16 with a scoreboard of nine birdies and three bogeys. Ko birdie the penultimate hole to score -16 while Ashok -15.

Not only par 18, so he had to enter the playoff (side hole) to compete for a silver medal with the host player. And Korda and Ashok both finished the last hole similar to Ko, but with different results. Korda wears a gold medal, Ashok alone is fourth.

The duel between Ko and Inami ended at hole 18, par4. Didn’t hit the bunker on the right side of the fairway and lost the distance on the second shot. She entered the green after her third shot, 2.4 meters from the target, but added two more putts to complete the hole. In contrast, Inami hit “like a textbook” – hit the fairway, hit the middle of the green on the second shot and two putts hold par. With this result, the Japanese player took the silver medal, while Ko had to accept the bronze – one level lower than the achievement at Rio 2016.

Korda entered Tokyo 2020 as the number one professional women’s golfer in the world (Rolex Rankings), hitting a women’s Olympic record of 18 holes with 62 strokes in her second match.

On the afternoon of August 1, the US team also took the men’s gold medal thanks to Xander Schauffele. The men’s content at that time, in addition to having determined the silver medal for Rory Sabbatini (Slovakia), had to organize a bronze medal playoff for seven players. The competition ended on the fourth extra hole, with CT Pan from Taiwan holding par and Schauffele’s compatriot Collin Morikawa bogey.

Quoc Huy