$1 Million Dollar Teenager is Making History

Lydia was born in Seoul, Korea on April 24^th 1997. Her family moved to New Zealand when Lydia was very young. She is a New Zealand National. She sure is breaking some records on the LPGA Tour. At the tender age of 17 she has already earned $1,061,019 this year alone in tour winnings. Yes and there’s sponsor endorsements on top of that, which I suspect are substantial. The million dollar mark was broken when she won the LPGA Marathon Classic. Her final round of 65 beat out runner-up Korea’s So Yeon Ryu by 1 shot. The 15 under par victory earned Lydia $210,000 putting her over the million dollar mark. And it’s only July.

Records

The record she broke was becoming the youngest LPGA player to earn $1 million in a year. Lydia is 17 months younger than Lexi Thompson the previous holder of that honor.

On January 29^th 2012, at age 14 Lydia became the youngest person ever to win a professional tour event. Playing as an amateur in Australia she won the ALPG Tour’s Samsung N.S.W. Women’s Open.

Before turning professional in October 2013 Lydia was the #1 amateur in the world for an amazing 130 weeks. That’s another record.

Lydia is not new to Winning

She has two Canadian Opens to her credit; winning both back-to-back (2012-2013) while she was an amateur. In April this year she won the LPGA Swinging Skirts Classic in San Francisco. Along with the Marathon Classic she now has four LPGA tournament wins to her credit. She also won both the U.S. Women’s Amateur and New Zealand Woman’s Amateur in 2012. In 2013 she won the New Zealand Woman’s Open. In 2013 she also won The Swinging Skirts Classic in Taipei, Taiwan.

Time Magazine

In April of this year, Time Magazine included her in their list of the world’s most influential people. At age 17 !!! This honor because she is such a positive influence on young people around the world. Also for creating more interest among young people, in the great sport of golf.

In the Rolex World Rankings

Lydia is currently in the #2 spot and as you can see keeping some pretty impressive company.

1. Stacy Lewis, U.S.A.
2. Lydia Ko, New Zealand
3. Inbee Park, Korea
4. Suzann Pettersen, Norway
5. Lexi Thompson, U.S.A.
6. Michelle Wei, U.S.A.
7. Karrie Webb, Australia
8. Shanshan Feng, China
9. So Yeon Ryu, Korea
10. Cristie Kerr, U.S.A.

Also just in

Sky SPORTS have nominated Lydia as their “Sportswoman of the Month” for July.

What to Watch

The LPGA Championship is to be played from August 14 through 17 in Pittsford, New York. For a total purse of $2,250,000. It will be the 4^th of five Majors played by the ladies this year and I for one along with a lot of Kiwis will be watching to see how Lydia plays.

I believe all her winning checks get deposited in her mother’s bank account and Lydia has no problem with that, as long as she’s allowed to go out and buy some electronics now and again. Something teenagers love to do.