When Lydia Ko won the Evian Championship last weekend, she joined a very short list of New Zealanders to win a Golf Major.

Only Sir Bob Charles and Michael Campbell had achieved the feat before.

But Ko’s success is a game changer, with growing numbers of young players trying to be like Lydia.

The real face of New Zealand golf is that four out of every five players are male and the largest group is aged from 55 to 65 – in other words, nothing like our most famous player right now, Ko.

The 18-year-old’s win this week at the Evian Championship in France saw her become the youngest ever female to win a major.

“We love Lydia a lot,” says former professional on the European tour and New Zealand Golf high performance coordinator Liz McKinnon.

She says Ko’s success is changing the game in New Zealand.

“There appears to be an increase in junior girls that are paying the game. There’s definitely an increase in awareness of golf at a younger age. She is a known sports superstar, and her name is as well known as Richie McCaw and Dan Carter.”

The power of Ko isn’t lost on New Zealand golf. She already fronts the LOVE Golf campaign.

She is now one of the faces behind She Loves Golf – a quest to get another 10,000 women playing the game in New Zealand.

via Kiwi golfers wanting to be ‘like Lydia’ | NZNews | 3 News.