Lydia Ko dominates the list of youngest all-time winners on the LPGA Tour – but will anyone ever beat the incredible record set on the Ladies European Tour?
In 1952, when American Marlene Hagge won twice on the LPGA Tour as an 18 years old, it would have been hard to imagine that decades later she would barely make the top 10 of youngest winners.
In fact it wasn’t until 2005 when Paula Creamer won the Sybase Classic that anyone else younger than 19 won on the LPGA Tour. Creamer was 18 years and 9 months old.
Hagge’s record was finally broken after 59 years by Lexi Thompson at the 2011 Navistar LPGA Classic. Thompson was 16 years, 7 months and 8 days old, becoming the first golfer younger than 18, and the first younger than 17, to win on the LPGA Tour.
But that record was surprisingly broken just one year later. In 2012, New Zealand’s Lydia Ko, the current world No. 1, set the record that still stands today by winning the Canadian Women’s Open aged 15 years, 4 months and 3 days. However, in terms of women’s professional golf as a whole, she has already been surpassed.
In 2017, Thailand’s Thitikul Atthaya became the youngest golfer ever to win a professional tournament, aged just 14 years, 4 months and 19 days when she won the Thailand Championship on the Ladies European Tour as an amateur.
Atthaya, the current world No. 4, went on to win her first LPGA Tour title at the JTBC Classic in March 2022 and her second at the Walmart NW Arkansas Championship in September – both aged just 19.
Top 10 youngest LPGA Tour winners
10: Marlene Hagge was 18 years, 14 days old when she won the 1952 Sarasota Open
9: Lydia Ko was 18 years, 2 days old when she won the 2015 Swinging Skirts LPGA Classic
8: Brooke Henderson was 17 years, 11 months, 6 days old when she won the 2015 LPGA Cambia Portland Classic
7: Lydia Ko was 17 years, 9 months, 29 days old when she won the 2015 Women’s Australian Open
6: Lydia Ko was 17 years, 6 months, 30 days when she won the 2014 CME Globe Tour Championship
5: Lydia Ko was 17 years, 2 months, 26 days old when she won the 2014 LPGA Marathon Classic
4: Lydia Ko was 17 years, 3 days old when she won the 2014 Swinging Skirts LPGA Classic
3: Lexi Thompson was 16 years, 7 months, 8 days old when she won the 2011 Navistar LPGA Classic
2: Lydia Ko was 16 years, 4 months, 1 day old when she won the 2013 Canadian Women’s Open
1: Lydia Ko was 15 years, 4 months, 3 days old when she won the 2012 Canadian Women’s Open
Record-breaking LPGA 2023 season tees off
The 2023 LPGA Tour season will hold 35 events, including five majors and the Solheim Cup. Players will be competing for a huge record-breaking total prize fund of $101.4 million, with 21 tournaments carrying purses of at least $2 million.
Lydia Ko won three times in 2022, cementing her place as the world’s No. 1 ranked golfer. But arguably the biggest star in women’s golf, current world No. 2 Nelly Korda, who recently signed an equipment deal with TaylorMade Golf, will want that top spot back.
