SAINT-QUENTIN-EN-YVELINES, France – Two weeks, 144 holes, six medal winners and numerous indelible moments have been made throughout golf’s fortnight on the Olympics.
From Scottie Scheffler’s emotional victory to Lydia Ko’s career-defining march to the LPGA Corridor of Fame, the Paris Video games didn’t disappoint.
Golf has arrived within the Olympics
Full cease.
In some ways, the 2016 and 2020 Video games have been a warm-up to this 12 months’s Olympics and a long-awaited victory lap for individuals who pushed the Worldwide Olympic Committee to permit golf again within the fold.
That preliminary pitch to the IOC targeted on three key areas:
- The highest gamers would purchase in to golf within the Olympics.
- The competitors could be compelling.
- The followers would embrace a sport that takes 4 days to crown a champion.
Examine, test and test.
GOLF IN REVIEW AT THE PARIS OLYMPICS
In contrast to in ’16 in Rio when a number of the recreation’s high gamers opted out, all of golf’s stars – each women and men – turned up for the Paris Video games and produced impressed finishes, with world No. 1 Scheffler closing with a 62 to win gold for the lads and Ko producing a machine-like efficiency down the stretch to win the ladies’s occasion (and a lot extra).
Each finishes also needs to put an finish to the narrative that 72-holes of stroke play is an uninspired option to crown Olympic champions. And the crowds that flocked to Le Golf Nationwide proved that with out a international pandemic, a golf-savvy host nation will embrace Olympic golf.
Podium Slam for Lydia Ko
It wasn’t straightforward to finish the fairytale, however Ko by no means anticipated it to be.
With the burden of a historical past on her shoulders, Ko outlasted the sphere on the Olympic ladies’s occasion to change into the primary golfer to win the gold, silver and bronze medals. She additionally earned the ultimate level for entry into the LPGA Corridor of Fame.
“I imply, Cinderella’s glass slippers are see-through and my podium sneakers are additionally see-through; I assume that’s one thing that we’ve got going for us. I really feel like I’m a part of this [fairy]story,” mentioned Ko, who closed with a 71 for a two-stroke victory over Germany’s Esther Henseleit. “Going into this week, everybody was saying, oh, what should you end and accumulate all of the gold on high of the silver and bronze you’ve got. After all I wish to try this, full it, too, but it surely’s a lot simpler mentioned than finished.”
Ko’s victory was something however comfy, regardless of constructing a five-stroke lead simply previous the flip at Le Golf Nationwide. The New Zealander’s lead was reduce to 2 pictures by a poor strategy on the par-4 13th gap that led to double-bogey 6, however she closed with 4 workmanlike pars and a birdie on the final to finish the trifecta.
As for incomes the clinching level to assert her spot within the LPGA Corridor of Fame, even Ko may admire the type factors.
“Did I think about that I used to be going to do it on the Paris Olympics? In all probability not,” she mentioned. “However that is undoubtedly the good solution to do it.”
Perspective for the sport
There’s a lesson to be gleaned from the truth that in lower than a 12 months two of probably the most memorable occasions in golf, the Ryder Cup and Olympics, have a mixed purse of $0.
Because the narrative in skilled golf continues to be about participant greed and unrealistic economics, Scheffler provided a monsoon of perspective throughout a tearful medal ceremony.
“It was simply very emotional being up there on stage there because the flag is being raised and sitting there singing the Nationwide Anthem. Sure, that’s undoubtedly one I’ll keep in mind for a very long time,” mentioned Scheffler, a six-time winner on the PGA Tour this season who isn’t precisely liable to emotional outburst.
The talk over the place an Olympic medal falls on the move chart of significance in golf will proceed, however let Scheffler’s emotion be a reminder of what it means to play for one thing greater than cash.
Olympic stress
The distinctive nature of Olympic golf, which focuses solely on the top-3 finishers, produced some really beautiful moments, together with Jon Rahm’s Sunday collapse throughout the males’s competitors.
The Spaniard was on cruise management with a four-shot lead with simply eight holes to play when his Olympics unraveled. The 2-time main champion bogeyed Nos. 11 and 12 and made a double-bogey 7 on the 14th gap. Rahm performed his method fully off the rostrum with two extra bogeys at Nos. 17 and 18.
“I don’t keep in mind the final time I performed a match and I felt this,” Rahm mentioned. “I don’t know what the phrase is as a result of, you already know, I not solely really feel like I let myself down however to only not get it finished for the entire nation of Spain, it’s much more painful than I would love it to be.”
Vive la France
An rising custom on the Olympics is to permit a participant from the host nation to hit the match’s first tee shot, a second that set the tone for each competitions when Victor Perez teed off to begin the lads’s occasion.
Perez then ignited the house crowd with a closing 63 that left him only one shot behind bronze medal winner Hideki Matsuyama. Through the ladies’s competitors, it was Celine Boutier who carried the flag with a gap 65.
Each gamers got here up quick of their bid to medal however the secret sauce is clear – golf within the Olympics is compelling, however leaning into the nationalistic part is a power multiplier.
Olympic emotion
For many athletes in Paris who solely get the possibility to compete on the highest stage each 4 years, the emotional toll of victory and defeat is clear. However even golfers – who’re given common alternatives for greatness – have been impacted by the fervour of the Video games.
Essentially the most notable instance of this was Tom Kim, whose bid to medal got here all the way down to the ultimate gap which he wanted to eagle to power a playoff with Matsuyama. Kim’s understandably aggressive try on the 72nd gap backfired, and he completed with a double-bogey 6 and an eighth-place end.
When Kim emerged from the scoring space he collapsed into his golf bag, overcome by emotion.
“By no means been actually emotional after a spherical. I believe these feelings are shocking, however I believe it’s simply all of the laborious work I’ve finished this 12 months to place myself on this place, these issues are popping out,” Kim mentioned. “Simply the issues Scottie [Scheffler] mentioned to me after the spherical actually type of got here out and I’m simply attempting to carry it collectively.”
Past Kim’s apparent want to win a medal, he may have additionally earned an exemption from obligatory army service again residence in South Korea had he earned a spot on the rostrum.
Olympic spirit
Probably the greatest components of the Olympic expertise for golfers is getting an opportunity to spend time with athletes from different sports activities, which is commonly eye-opening.
That mutual admiration was a two-way avenue throughout the males’s competitors when Paul Juda, a member of the US’ five-man gymnast workforce that gained bronze, made the journey out to Le Golf Nationwide to cheer on Staff USA.
“That is superior,” Juda smiled. “I simply don’t perceive how they’re in a position to do what they do. It’s superb.”
It’s most likely secure to say the golfer’s suppose the identical factor about Juda’s space of experience.
