HILTON GRAND VACATIONS TOURNAMENT OF CHAMPIONS

January 29, 2026

Nelly Korda

Lake Nona Golf & Country Club

Quick Quotes

Q. All right, very pleased to be joined by Nelly Korda after her first round here at the Hilton Grand Vacations Tournament of Champions. Very solid start for you today. Just take us through the round.

NELLY KORDA: Yeah, started off birdie, birdie. Overall it was solid. The greens are slick. I made a couple mistakes coming in: One three-putt and one missed green on 17.

Overall happy with my round. Just Thursday, so hopefully I can continue building momentum going into the next three days.

But, yeah, can't complain.

Q. How does the game feel getting a full actual round in under your belt versus maybe how it felt coming into the week?

NELLY KORDA: It feels good. Yeah, I've been working on a couple things, especially with my posture, the fundaments of golf. You're kind of constantly -- no matter what level you're at, I feel like it's super important to always work on those.

It was nice to kind of see those things in action today.

Q. You've had a lot of good success at this tournament; runner-up finish last year. What is it about this course that brings out some of the strengths of your game?

NELLY KORDA: Yeah, honestly, it reminds me a little bit of Concession, my home course. I'm just comfortable. I have my family in the crowd. I have some friends out here, too.

Overall I think it's also just like a comfort thing. I grew up on bermuda, so, you know, I love playing out here.

Q. I know people might have forgot you won the 2021 Gainbridge out here. Do you come back to this property and like kind of gives you a boost thinking back to that win and then I think you've had like five Top 5s in this tournament?

NELLY KORDA: Yeah, of course. I mean, it's a good confidence boost knowing that I've played well on this golf course. You know, you really have to be dialed off the tee, but the greens are really tricky out here.

You have to really dial into the spots you want to hit it on. I think that's what makes it so tough and also so fun for me; you really have to be precise to be on the right parts of the green.

So overall, yeah, the confidence helps, but you also have to execute the shots and that's what I really like about Lake Nona.

Q. The wind off that water is obviously super cold; also makes golf shots a little bit challenge to go hit.

NELLY KORDA: Yeah.

Q. How do you adjust playing with that, especially when it's cold out?

NELLY KORDA: Well, today it was only cold for probably the first couple holes. I was expecting the wind to be a little bit higher than it was, but it was actually pretty calm and really nice out, so you were able to be a little bit more aggressive.

I know that the wind is projected to kind of increase every single day as the tournament goes on, so you're really going to have to dial in and be confident in your start lines. And it's not just that it affects your tee shots and shots into the greens, it really affects your putts as well.

So just making sure that in the back of your head that you're reiterating that it's windy and it's going to affect your shots is really important.

Q. Both the Korda sisters are pretty close with Austin Ernst.

NELLY KORDA: Yeah.

Q. How cool is it to see her back out here after a couple years away?

NELLY KORDA: It was great. I went to dinner with her on Monday. It's so funny because she hasn't been on Tour in three years and she's like, I'm back, and I'm back at the Tournament of Champions.

But it's really nice just to kind of see the old faces, the people that you used to hang out with, and to catch up on life. She is in a different part of her life with a baby sure Charlie, but it's so exciting to hear the milestones for her.

Yeah, it's been fun to hang out with her this week again. Hopefully more times this year, but you never know.

Q. The putter was hot early in the round.

NELLY KORDA: Uh-huh.

Q. Compare the greens here in terms of speed and difficulty to what you typically see week to week on the LPGA?

NELLY KORDA: Yes, definitely I would say speed-wise they remind me a lot of Pelican. So Pelican gets to kind of almost 13 to 14, and I would say it's very close to that here.

So it's more about the lag putts because there is so much undulation, where it looks like it's uphill and all of a sudden it kind of like -- the ball picks up a lot of speed and kind of goes back downhill. Like those are the Lake Nona putts where they're like up and down.

So those are the ones that are really get to get the speed of the greens, but I would say this tournament and Pelican, they're very similar speed-wise, but definitely faster than our average probably on Tour.

Just depends where we are. When we're up north in the summer those greens are pure as well. I would say everything depends on the weather that they've had in the winter to get ready for our event.

But these greens are definitely very slick.

Q. Given your success at both venues, I'm going to guess that you enjoy this, the challenge.

NELLY KORDA: Yeah, it's very challenging. It's all about placement. Obviously you have to be -- I think you have to dial in a little bit more to make sure, okay, I don't want a downhill left-to-righter. Okay, I'm going to aim maybe to the right of this pin. Or making sure that I'm actually in the right quadrants of the green for that hole location.

Q. Swanky new locker room this year.

NELLY KORDA: Yeah.

Q. What it like on the inside?

NELLY KORDA: It's great. It's very, very pretty. Also the gym upstairs a great. It's definitely been a good new addition to just Lake Nona I would say.

Q. You mentioned that it's different with your driver when you get in competition; you have adrenaline.

NELLY KORDA: Yeah.

Q. Did you notice any differences compared to the range?

NELLY KORDA: I really liked it. Obviously a lot of good feedback from today. I saw that my stats said like that I had a low amount of fairways hit, but they were like an inch or two, sometime in the first cut.

So I don't really go off my stats but the way that it felt was really nice.