As she closes out a year of hole-outs, heartbreaks, and hard-earned progress, Nelly Korda talks about managing pressure, tuning out the noise, and finding confidence in the grind that defined her 2025 campaign.
Q. After the final round of the CME Group Tour Championship. Just wrapped up here. What can you say about this week and honestly just the season as a whole for you?
NELLY KORDA: Obviously the main goal was to finish on top, but after my first day I did give it a run for it. Even thought leaders were super far ahead. Always felt like I was playing catchup in a sense.
Overall, yeah, another year. I’m grateful for it all. Grateful for the highs, lows, and grateful for my team.
Q. You tapped in one of the best shots of your year on the 11th. Take us through that hole-out.
NELLY KORDA: Yeah, hit my driver a little out right. Honestly wasn’t a bad place to miss it out there. I had 136 yards which was a perfect 9-iron and I hit it — like I hit it really pure, which is also really nice when you hole-out, when it all matches up.
And I’ve never heard Jason yell that loud. Even the cameraman he was like, dude, I got scared. It was nice to see that go in. In the past year I’ve been lipping out, so for it to be the last round of the year, obviously last round of the season, it felt good to see that go in.
Q. When you look back at 2025 what’s a word you’ll use to describe the season and why?
NELLY KORDA: A grind. Yeah, just there was — I feel like there was a lot of ups and downs and it made me grow a lot mentally and I would say I’m just also very grateful for it because, you know, success is never linear.
Q. How do you think you’ve grown mentally?
NELLY KORDA: I would just say expectations, listening to outside noises, really just sticking to what I know best, and that’s to keep everything simple.
Q. Are there any shots that replay through your mind throughout the course of the season that you wish you could have back?
NELLY KORDA: Yeah, precisely No. 18 at the U.S. Open. I actually hit that shot so good. Probably hit that shot the best that I did all year, and just because of the adrenaline I hit it probably, I don’t know, ten yards too long and a little bit too left; was in the place that at the beginning of the week on Monday I was like, I cannot be here, and I was there.
So if I could get one shot back, that would be it.
But I mean, there are so many. That’s the one that kind of comes to mind, yeah.
But everything happens for a reason.
Q. It’s interesting that this many years in adrenaline is still something that you have to figure out and factor in.
NELLY KORDA: Yeah.
Q. I guess it varies from moment to moment exactly how adrenaline will impact a shot.
NELLY KORDA: Yeah, I think everyone kind of deals with it. You’re always learning. You never have it figured out really. That’s why it always humbles you.
Q. When you talked about your team early this week and how they have kind of given you a different look at things when you vent to them, just curious what have they given you perspective on that you can’t maybe yourself can’t take a step back and look at?
NELLY KORDA: Yeah, just kind of like more of like outcomes of tournaments. Like where you’re just kind of looking at the actual outcome of not winning, not finishing inside the top 10, not contending. At the end of the day like it’s all about also improving from week to week, especially if maybe you’re in the hitting it great and you see an improvement in that.
So just kind of more of a different perspective.
Q. You said you’ll remember the highs and the lows from this year. What do you consider one or two of the highs or one or two of the lows?
NELLY KORDA: Highs was probably the U.S. Women’s Open. I mean, the adrenaline rush, there is nothing like it. The highs are probably like seeing like the great flashes in my game where I’m very excited about the work that I put in.
Then some of the lows are like every girl can say that out here, ever pro can say that, you put so much time in effort into your craft and you just don’t play well. You just do it over and over and over again. Sometimes you just go a little crazy.
Q. LeBron commented again on a Nelly post. I don’t know, is there a future round?
NELLY KORDA: Hopefully, fingers crossed. I mean, he is a very busy man and we definitely do not live on the same coast of the U.S.
So if timing matches up it would be great to play with him.
Q. How cool is it to see people like that react to the women’s game?
NELLY KORDA: It’s so great. You kind of see it across different sports, and it’s fun to see women’s golf have its moment as well. You see the tennis where all the stars come and watch all the amazing pros and then you see it with the men’s game, too. For people to finally see not just myself but all the other amazing girls out here and finally get their time, you know to be on primetime TV and people to invest in us and our craft and really know that we are great, has been a lot of fun.
I hope to see it continue growing.
Q. Just one quick one: Jeeno now has set a single-season scoring record beating Annika’s record from 2002.
NELLY KORDA: Yeah.
Q. Can you put in perspective how hard it is to beat any of Annika’s records, but what that means over the course of a year?
NELLY KORDA: Yeah, it’s quite amazing. Great talent, great player. It’s fun to see her craft kind of up close as well.
But, yeah, I mean, it’s kind of crazy, right? To finally beat a record so far in — what was it, 2002 you said? For it to take until 2025, I mean, it’s crazy. That just tells you that the greats don’t come along too often
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