Nelly Korda has already claimed the first two women’s golf majors this season. After winning the U.S. Women’s Open earlier this month, she revealed that her 2025 runner-up finish at the event made her realize that she was “just hungry for more.” Now, at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship held at Hazeltine National Golf Club, she has a chance to achieve that more. But a victory doesn’t just mean a third major this year for the World No. 1; it will also move her closer to becoming an LPGA Hall of Famer.

The last American to achieve the feat was Juli Inkster in 1999. She’ll also become the first player since Inbee Park in 2013 to claim the first three majors of the LPGA season. Here is how she performed in the first round of the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship.

Nelly Korda’s story of the front nine

Starting on the front nine, she started her round with three straight pars. But she followed it with a bogey on par-3 4th. Her 176-yard tee shot that landed in the left rough. She missed the fairways on holes two and three, too, but this one proved brutal because of the Kentucky bluegrass. Her second shot left of the green left her 18 feet and 6 inches from the hole. She missed the par putt.

However, she was quick to recover from that with consecutive birdies on the par-4 6th and the par-5 7th. Two more par saves followed, and she made the turn at 1-under. Her performance on the back nine was exceptional except for a costly mistake.

Nelly Korda’s costly mistake on the back nine

Korda hit three birdies on the back nine. The first was on the par-5 11th, followed by the par-3 13th and the par-5 15th. At that point, she was 4-under and in strong contention to finish the opening round inside the top five. But there came her costly mistake on the 16th.

She teed off with a pretty decent 260-yard drive, but it landed in the creek on the left side. This led to a penalty and a drop off at 130 yards to the hole. While her third shot landed on the green, she three-putted and succumbed to a double bogey. 16th, notably, played as the third-toughest hole of the round, and Korda’s was one of the seven doubles or worse at the par-4. It was also her first double or higher in her last 347 holes. Korda followed it with two pars on the 17th and 18th to finish with 2-under 70.

“So the wind was off the right, and I actually think I just made too fast a swing, and I was kind of in between clubs. It’s a pretty intimidating tee shot, and I just didn’t really like the way I hit it off the start,” the 19-time LPGA Tour winner said about her tee shot on the 16th.

While the hiccup on the 16th slightly derailed her opening round, Nelly Korda is still optimistic.

“It was solid. Honestly, just made one bad swing, which ended up in a double. Overall, pretty happy with my day,” she added.

Nelly Korda sits at T19 after the first round. Her stats for the opening round are as follows:

• SG: Total: 3.139
• SG: Off-the-Tee: 0.504
• SG: Approach-the-Green: 2.115
• SG: Around-the-Green: 0.007
• SG: Tee-to-Green: 2.576
• SG: Putting: 0.562

Korda, heading into the third major of the season, said, “I don’t want to put extra pressure on myself. I feel like the game of golf is already hard enough. If I add more pressure on myself, then it’s going to be even harder. I think it’s an amazing accomplishment [entering LPGA Hall of Fame], and it would be one of the best achievements of my career, for sure.”

Her comments show that she wanted to focus on just lifting the trophy. Although it was not a dream start like Ina Yoon, who currently leads with an opening round of 9-under 63, the World No. 1 still has very strong chances to rise to the top of the leaderboard in the following rounds.

You can watch her play in Round 2 in the same group. This time, she will start on the back nine at 1:42 PM CDT at Hazeltine National Golf Club.