Lydia Ko is now a major champion, three-time tour winner and gold medallist – this season alone. Ko added the Kroger Queen City Championship title to her bulging trophy cabinet yesterday, for the 30th win of her professional career.
Just last month, the Kiwi was inducted into the LPGA Hall of Fame, and it seemed retirement beckoned.
But Ko, 27, has shelved those plans and admitted she has her sights set on a new goal. “I struggled a lot during the middle of the season,” Ko said after her latest win. “I was in a place where [I thought] am I really going to be in the Hall of Fame and had those doubts. “I had a fairytale of those past couple months and now I feel like if I set my mind to it, maybe I can do it.
“It’s always been the goal of mine to do the career grand slam. “I thought that would be so out there, but I feel like I’ve already been part of this fairytale, so why not?” Ko, who has her hands on three of the game’s five major championships, is yet to win the Women’s PGA Championship and US Women’s Open.
But a shot at both in 2025 would be well received by fans after Ko insisted in August that she would weigh up her options at the end of the season. Ko remains certain she will not let her game make the retirement decision for her, though. “Lorena Ochoa is somebody I really look up to,” she added. “I hoped that my career would be quite similar – retiring when I’m still playing well.
“I’ve always said that I would rather retire and then say, ‘if I kept playing maybe I could have won a few more’, rather than retire at a point where I feel like I should have left the game a long time ago. “I don’t know when that moment is right now. I enjoyed these past three weeks and it was great being home and not to live out of my suitcase.
“While I’m competitively playing it’s good to have goals. The career grand slam seems too far out there, but what has happened the past couple months has been that extent of craziness, I guess.
“I just wanted to set a goal that was something that I can work towards and whether that’s happens or not isn’t as important.
“It’s just more the drive for me to keep wanting to put myself in contention and hopefully be the one holding the trophy at the end of the week more and more after this week as well.”
