Nelly Korda had a dominant — and unusual — 2024

The previous 12 months had all of it — loopy profitable streaks, new main champs, a major-week arrest (!) and extra. With 2025 on the horizon, our writers are wanting again on the most memorable moments from 2024.

No. 15 — Charley Hull goes viral | No. 14 — LIV, LPGA CEOs say goodbye | No. 13— Solheim Cup parking fiasco | No. 12 — Phoenix Open chaos | No. 11 — Lydia Ko’s Corridor of Fame resurgence | No. 10 — PGA Tour/Saudi PIF merger stalemate | No. 9 — Keegan Bradley named Ryder Cup captain | No. 8 — Lexi Thompson stepped away | No. 7 — Xander Schauffele’s main breakthrough | No. 6 – AK’s return to golf

Greatest golf moments of 2024 No. 5: The 12 months of Nelly Korda

In the event you paid any consideration to ladies’s golf in 2024, it was a BIG 12 months for Nelly Korda.

Seven wins. One main title. Eleven prime 10s. A Solheim Cup victory. Sum all of it up and also you’ve received a runaway Participant of the Yr winner — and a historic season. Not since Yani Tseng in 2011 has anybody gained as many instances in a season as Korda did in 2024.

In a single season, the 26-year-old practically doubled her profession win complete — and put a stranglehold on the highest spot within the Rolex Rankings. By 12 months’s finish, the margin between Korda and the world’s second-ranked participant (Ruoning Yin) was the identical because the hole between Yin and No. 117. That’s some prime-Tiger Woods stage of domination.

“By no means in 1,000,000 years would I’ve thought final 12 months, one year in the past, I’d be right here with seven wins in a single season and one other main championship,” Korda mentioned after the LPGA Tour Championship. “Simply motivated and desirous to get subsequent 12 months going once more.”

Korda’s banner 12 months wasn’t simply restricted to the golf course. She shined away from the taking part in discipline as nicely. Again in Might, she made a shock look on the Met Gala, changing into the primary golfer since Tiger Woods to seem on the occasion.

“It was only a dream come true,” Korda mentioned. “It was actually, actually neat to step exterior of my consolation zone and do one thing like that.”

That step exterior her consolation zone paid off. On the energy of her broad, mainstream enchantment, Korda cashed loads of endorsement checks. By 12 months’s finish, Korda ranked because the eight-highest-paid feminine athlete on the planet.

On the floor stage, it seems 2024 couldn’t have gone significantly better for the World No. 1. Nevertheless, that’s to not say there wasn’t adversity — and even slumps.

Simply two weeks after her win on the Mizuho America’s Open, Korda arrived on the U.S. Ladies’s Open trying to win the largest title in all of girls’s golf. Her conquest was derailed earlier than it might even achieve any momentum. On her third gap of the championship, she discovered the water three(!) instances en path to a ten. She fired 80 in that opening spherical and missed the reduce the next day.

She missed the reduce in her subsequent begin, too, earlier than heading to the KPMG Ladies’s PGA Championship trying to regroup. As a substitute, her struggles received even worse. After an opening-round 69 at Sahalee Nation Membership, she imploded in Spherical 2 with an 81 — the worst rating of her profession.

“It’s simply golf not too long ago for me,” she mentioned. “No phrases for the way I’m taking part in proper now … Loads went my means initially a part of the 12 months and simply giving it again.” 

That Friday may’ve been all-time low for Korda’s 2024, nevertheless it wasn’t the top of her struggles. On the Olympics later in the summertime, she arrived in Paris trying to win her second gold medal. As a substitute, she turned in a lackluster Sunday efficiency — together with a shank — to complete exterior the highest 20.

With two extra possibilities at including to her main complete on the finish of the summer time, Korda turned in spirited performances ending T26 and T2, however finally a summer time that began with a lot promise resulted in a sputter. By the point the autumn rolled round, Korda appeared bodily — and emotionally — spent. When the LPGA headed to Asia for his or her fall swing, Korda opted to remain stateside to nurse a nagging neck harm.

“I’m disillusioned to overlook these occasions and am particularly sorry to my followers who have been wanting ahead to seeing me play,” she mentioned on the time. “I’m at present resting and dealing with my workforce to get higher.”

Like all nice gamers, although, Korda didn’t keep down lengthy. When the Tour arrived again in Floria for the season’s ultimate stretch, the World No. 1 seemed again to her regular self. In her first begin again from harm, Korda nabbed her seventh victory of the season at Annika Sorenstam’s event in Tampa. The next week, she clinched Participant of the Yr honors.

“[I’m] pleased with the best way I bounced again after the center of the 12 months to win in Tampa,” she mentioned. “And, yeah, simply motivated and desirous to get subsequent 12 months going once more.”

If Korda can play something like she did this 12 months, we will count on 2025 to be one other huge 12 months.

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