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| Kim Sei-young watches her drive on the first day of the Women's British Open Golf Championships at Woburn Golf Club in central England, Thursday. / AFP-Yonhap |
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Golf returns to the Olympics after a 112-year absence. The 2016 Summer Olympics will be the first time you will be able to watch golf played at the games since the 1904 Summer Olympics.
The 2016 Summer Olympics features two events, one for men and one for women. Each event is a 72-hole individual stroke play tournament under the official rules of golf. If players tie for a medal, a three-hole playoff decides the winner.
Golf at the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, takes place at the New Olympic Golf course. The male golfers tee off on August 11, while female big names starting on August 17.
South Korea sends four top-class golfers to the Olympics. Representing the country are Park In-bee, 28; Yang Hee-young, 27; Kim Sei-young, 23; and Chun In-gee, 22. They will battle with strenuous efforts to take the gold medal home. South Korea is the only country sending four woman golfers to the Rio Olympics. They are all players in the top 10 of the 2016 Olympic Golf Final Rankings.
An Byeong-hun and Wang Jeung-hun are representing the South Korean men at Rio. An said, "Hopefully, I'll get one of the medals. It would be nice if it's gold. It's one better than my parents." An Byeong-hun's parents won medals in table tennis at the 1988 Olympics. His mother won a silver medal and a bronze; his father captured a bronze.
South Korean golf fans have hopes that Korea will dominate in the Olympics, winning the gold medal. They want South Korean women to make a clean sweep of all three medals.
Guessing who will win the gold, however, is difficult. Each player, for instance, has her favorite courses. Some golfers like to play on wild, long, windy courses. Others hate difficult courses.
Equally important is pairing. Short hitters have difficulty keeping their natural swing pace constant when they play with long hitters. Pro and amateur golfers don't differ when it comes down to distance.
Often, you see an obscure player appear out of nowhere and subdue her opponents, snatching the medal. Nobody knows if this will happen at the Rio Summer Olympics.
The Olympic Golf Course reportedly features wide fairways and shallow roughs.
The first Korean athlete to watch is Kim Sei-young. Her average driving distance is 272 yards. She is the world's number 6-ranked player in average driving distance. Yang Hee-young (Amy) is another South Korean favorite to bring the Olympic gold medal home. Her average driving distance is 267 yards, which is 14th in the world rankings of average driving distance.
Granted, Lexi Thompson from the U.S. will catch your eye. She hits her ball, on average, 283 yards off the tee. She is the top player in the world in average driving distance.
If the golf course is not so long, Park In-bee and Chun In-gee can claim the gold. Still, they should beat their chief rivals: Lydia Ko, 19, from New Zealand and Ariya Jutanugarn, 20, from Thailand. Lydia Ko is the number one ranked player in the world and an ethnic Korean. Ariya Jutanugarn is an athlete inside the top 10 of the Rio Olympic Golf Final Rankings.
Jutanugarn made her first three victories consecutively, creating new history on the LPGA Tour. She whacks her ball far. She does not use her driver on tight courses. "She obviously doesn't need one," said world number one Lydia Ko, who once played with Jutanugarn. Even when she hit her driver, Ko was routinely 20 or 30 yards behind Jutanugarn.
The Olympic Golf course is 5,944-meters long for women. This says Park and Chun need to play great short games, holing all the must-make short putts. After all, without making clutch putts, no player will take the Olympic gold medal.
The male player to watch is the British Open champion Henrik Stenson, a 40-year-old Swede. His superb 8-under 63 tied the lowest final round in history. His overall score of 20-under was the lowest ever seen at The British Open. He is the favorite expected to claim Olympic gold.
Incidentally, six of the top-10 male players in the world rankings pulled out of the Rio Summer Olympics. They mentioned the mosquito-borne Zika virus as a cause to withdraw. But critics cited other causes including no prize money, not enough points for rankings and already full tournament schedules. Also, they criticized the format: 72-hole stroke play, just like the Tour events. They also complained about the limited field size of 60 players.
The Rio 2016 Olympic Golf Course is near the main Olympic Park. The golf course is roughly nine kilometers from the Athletes' Village. The course reportedly has two artificial lakes and plenty of bunkers. The windy golf course is close to the sea.
Kim Jeong-kyoo is a Korea Times golf columnist. He can be reached at kimjstar@hanmail.net.
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