In a sport where triumphs often are measured by fractions of inches, Lydia Ko shaved off a mile.
Ko, 17, in her second year on the LPGA Tour, last weekend finished joint second in the tour’s season opener and unseated former South Korean compatriot Park Inbee as the No 1 player in the women’s game.
In the process, she did a great leap over a significant milestone.
Tiger Woods was 21 in 1997 when he became the youngest player of either gender to reach No 1, and Ko carved a stunning three years, eight months and 14 days off Woods’ mark – the equivalent of breaking a course record by a half-dozen shots.
Her coach, David Leadbetter, runs an academy for promising youngsters and has tutored many rising talents over the years, including Michelle Wie. Ko is 17 going on 25, as one LPGA player put it, and never seems to blink.
“It’s just her maturity and level-headedness out there,” Leadbetter said. “We sent her to anger-management so she could learn how to get angry.”
Ko is poised, by any definition, to rule the roost for years to come. Well, except for that curious asterisk called history.
All too quickly, young female players, such as Lorena Ochoa, Yani Tseng and Jiyai Shin, have quit or stumbled off the mountaintop after claiming the top spot, citing burnout or boredom. Ko, on the other hand, does not seem to grasp the meaning of stress. Now what?
“It’s going to be fun to watch,” Leadbetter said.
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