Lydia Ko told her longest-running sponsor, Rolex, that it would be cool one day to have a collage of the highs and lows of her career.
It wasn't a retirement video. That day will come eventually, of course, but Lydia Ko told her longest-running sponsor, Rolex, that it would be cool one day to have a collage of the highs and lows of her career.
Rolex delivered, and the commercial debuted earlier this summer during the Amundi Evian Championship. Ko went to a recording studio to voice a script she said brought her to tears.
"I was able to kind of fill in the gaps in between and the emotions I felt," said Ko of her involvement. "As much as sometimes you get caught up in what's going on right now, but when I see my career like that as a whole, it just -- I think I am the player I am today because of all those moments, and probably the lows ... are probably more significant than the highs."
Ko met with the media on Wednesday ahead of this week's CPKC Women's Open in Ontario. Her first victory on the LPGA came at the age of 15 at the 2012 CN Canadian Women's Open, two weeks after she'd won the U.S. Women's Amateur. She'd win the Canadian Women's Open again the next year at 16.
Now a member of the LPGA Hall of Fame with 23 LPGA titles, including three majors as well as an Olympic gold medal, Ko's remarkable career is a testament to her mental strength – overcoming the lows – as much as her talent.
Rolex scripted the ad as a letter from Ko to her 15-year-old self.
"Dear 15-year-old Lydia, so much is about to happen. Wonderful things and hard things. You will learn and grow as a person from all of them. You will lose track of all the firsts and the youngest evers you set. Never take a single day, a single moment for granted.
"The truest axiom of golf is this ... no matter how you are playing, it will change. Just as quickly as the game can slip away, with hard work and self-belief, it can come back.
"The decisions you make are yours – own them."
Ko said that when recording, she repeated the same line anywhere from five to 10 times, trying to convey the right emotions. Some of what she experienced reading that letter, she said, are feelings she had yet to express to her own team.
"It was definitely really cool seeing the 6, 7-year-old me skipping down the fairways in New Zealand to hoisting the AIG Women's Open trophy at St. Andrews," said Ko. "It's a pretty surreal career I've had so far. I think because all of those moments, I'm able to enjoy being on tour a little bit more these days."
The sports world has watched Ko grow up on a global stage, winning LPGA events long before she could even drive.
When asked about that kicker line of owning her decisions, Ko praised the evolving team she's had around her from the start to help guide her career, but insisted that she's always had a say.
"If I decided to end my relationship with a caddie or with a coach or decided to play this event or that, I think I was still always the biggest influence," said Ko. "When you were so young, people think you're under the influence of your parents and that's true. I think to some extent like they're trying to do that because they think that's the best for you.
"But I think even from a young age I was – I made most of the decisions myself. But I think now as I get older, I'm able to take more ownership of that. I believe that all of the decisions I made, whether it was good or bad, whether the results were good or bad, I've no regrets in making them. All of those little pieces make that final masterpiece. If one piece is different, then I don't know if I would be the same person or if my career would be the same."
This article originally appeared on Golfweek: LPGA star Lydia Ko voiced TV ad that brought her to tears
Category: General Sports
