Lydia Ko Grabs Olympic Gold: “It really can't get any better.”

“It's definitely a life peak for me here,” Lydia Ko said after winning the Olympic gold medal in golf. “I don't think I've experienced this kind of adrenaline before, and to do it here, it really can't get any better.”

It wasn’t as easy as it should have been for Lydia Ko to win it. She was tied for the lead at the start of the final round, but by the back nine, she was five shots ahead of the field. The golf course was not a pushover as anyone who watched either the men’s or women’s event could see. With a ball in the water at the 13th hole, she opened the gate for her competition, and it made her victory that much more difficult to achieve. 

“I hit a great tee shot on 13, and to be honest, I didn't imagine it going in the water, and it wasn't like that poor of a golf shot,” she explained about the one big error of her round.

But In the end, it was Lydia Ko at 10-under.

Esther Henseleit of Germany finished at 8-under, and Xiyu Lin of China at 7-under, taking the medal spots.

“Going into this week, everyone was saying, Oh, what if you finish and collect all the gold on top of the silver and bronze you have,” she said to media after the victory. “Of course I want to do that, complete it, too, but it's much easier said than done.”

She was so intent on it that she disabled her Instagram for the week because she didn’t want to be affected by what other people said.  She said she has not had the New Zealand national anthem on repeat on Spotify, but when she heard it at the medal ceremony, she could definitely understand why Scottie Scheffler cried. She did too.

Ko knew where she stood all day. She paid attention to the leaderboard so she would know what she had to do. Her focus was on hitting what she called “quality golf shots” to give herself opportunities to score. She was intent on not letting others dictate how she played. Of course, that can be easier said than done. The result showed how much determination Ko has as a competitor.

“Hitting my tee shot on 18 in the fairway and second on the fairway as well, I think that was able to give me a little bit of a sigh of relief but I know that in golf, it's never over until the very end,” she said. “I wanted to focus until that ball dropped in the hole.”

There was the extra pressure of needing one more victory to enter the Hall of Fame on LPGA criteria.

“Did I imagine that I was going to do it at the Paris Olympics? Probably not. But this is definitely the coolest way to do it,” she added. “For it to have all come together here at the Olympics, it's really cool. So it's rewarding for the whole team and family.”

Her husband was in the U.S. during the event, but Ko put his name on her marker so she would be reminded that he was always with her.

Before this year, Ko already had a silver medal from the 2016 Olympics and a bronze medal from the 2020 Olympics. How many people can say that?

She has played in all three Olympics since golf was reintroduced. Of course, she has the distinct advantage of not having as many professional golfers in New Zealand as countries like the U.S. have so there is not as much competition for spots.  But she deserves credit for medaling each time she played. Three medals for three Olympics is pretty strong. At this point, she has ruled out participating in 2024.