‘Birdie Bomber’ Ko Go-woo, 21, of Samcheon-ri, Korea, has used her guts to win her first career title.
Ko shaved seven strokes off her score in the final round of the 2023 KLPGA Tour McCall-Mona Yongpyong Open with SBS Golf on Sunday at Birch Hill GC in Pyeongchang, Gangwon Province.
Ko, who was tied for sixth after shaving three strokes off her first round score and four strokes off her second round score, used her daily best on the final day to post a 14-under-par total of 202, which propelled her to the top of the leaderboard ahead of Song (-10), who was looking for a wire-to-wire victory.
It was Ko’s first taste of victory in 44 starts on the LPGA Tour. She also took home a first-place prize of 144 million won.
“Before I started, I was thinking, ‘It’s going to be hard to make birdies today because of the pin positions, and I can only birdie a couple of 토토사이트 par-5s that are two-on,'” Ko explained in the post-tournament press conference, explaining how he shaved seven strokes off his final round.
“You can’t forget the putts. I remember the par putt on 15. I didn’t hit it to make it. I hit it thinking it would go in, and it did. In fact, I could see the line before I hit it,” he laughed.
Ko made his debut on the PGA Tour last year and was nicknamed the ‘birdie bomber’ after his 336 birdies tied him with Hae-Ran Lee for the most birdies.
However, in the final round of the tournament, Ko decided that the course was tricky, so he decided to be less greedy, and true to his word, the putts fell in and he was able to take home the coveted trophy.
He also stuck to his aggressive style of play on the par-5s.
There were four par-5s in the tournament, two on the front and two on the back, including the 3rd (482 yards), 8th (504 yards), 10th (546 yards), and 18th (526 yards). And it was on these par-5s that Ko showed his unique color.
First, Ko made a bogey on the third hole on the first day of the tournament after failing to get his third shot onto the green, and he was penalized again on the 10th hole.
In the second round, however, as his shots became more consistent, he adopted a different strategy. Confident in his distance, Ko had the guts to put his second shot on the green at the eighth and 10th holes. This, coupled with his sharpness in the final round, led to an eagle putt on the 10th.
Long par-5s are where most players try to be aggressive and go for birdie. In fact, the tour average for par-5s this season is 4.968.
Ko, on the other hand, hasn’t had much luck on par-5s this season, with a stroke average of 5.0066 (83rd). It’s a far cry from last year (4.8923, 30th), when he made tons of birdies. There was a reason for that. “At the beginning of this season, I had a lot of personal problems, so I didn’t focus on golf. Now I’m focusing on golf,” he said.
This tournament was a different story. Ko played a total of 12 holes on par-5s over the weekend and shot a 53, giving him a staggering 4.4167 stroke average. It was a combination of renewed focus and aggression.
