Le Golf National awaits Olympic start
Le Golf National – file photo PGA of America
The 2024 Olympic Golf competition begins on Thursday, Australia’s men’s team comprises Jason Day and Min Woo Lee while Minjee Lee and Hannah Green will compete in next week’s women’s event.
The 72-hole events are being played at Le Golf National in Paris.
New Zealand has Ryan Fox and Daniel Hiller while for the women only Lydia Ko made the qualifying criteria.
Both Jason Day and Min Woo Lee are debutantes for Australia in the Olympics. Day finished 13th in his latest start at the Open Championship while Lee missed the cut at Royal Troon.
For Day he is excited about being able to represent Australia in this format for the first occasion having declined the opportunity in 2016 due to a scare re the Zika virus and the scheduling of the event and not having qualified in 2021.
“To be honest I wasn’t ever thinking about it,” said Day. “I know in 2016, looking back on it, I’ve said it before, where there was some regret, obviously, not going down. At the time I think I was like No. 1 or 2 in the world and I think I was like to a point where I was kind of burnt out, and the last thing on my mind was representing Australia in the Olympics.
“Looking back on it, I should just sucked it up and gone down and played. I think in that case it would have been a great experience for me to go down there and represent something that’s bigger than you, you know what I mean.
“And then obviously when it came to Tokyo — Japan is one of my favourite countries to go visit. I had some injuries and stuff, and obviously Cam and Marc were ranked higher than me.
“I just felt that if I could just play half-decent at some point, I would be able to get back on the team. It would be nice to be able to get into the Olympics in L.A. and then obviously hopefully get in the Olympics in Brisbane. But that’s a long time from now.”
Min Woo Lee is delighted with the opportunity and also the Le Golf National layout.
“Yeah, unbelievable honour. It’s been a while since I’ve been in a team event, and obviously representing Australia in the Olympics, it’s a massive honour, and it’s a massive deal.
“So I’m very excited to be here and Le Golf National is looking very, very nice. It’s good and challenging in its ways. The rough is thick. So we’ll go out there and see the front nine today, but yesterday was really good.”
Minjee Lee will play her third Olympics having finished 7th in Rio de Janeiro in 2016 and 29th in Tokyo while Hannah Green was 5th in her only appearance in Tokyo.
For New Zealand Fox is playing his third Olympic competition having finished 39th in Rio and 42nd in Tokyo, while Hillier gets his first opportunity.
Ko has finished runner-up and 3rd in her two appearances.
